Human birds
by Fleppy85
Summary: Greg and Sara find a dead man in the desert who has got wings. Together with Sofia they've to figure out who killed the man & why he had wings. Again, I'm sorry for all mistakes and the grammar
1. Chapter 1

**Tuesday night**

It has been a hot day today, with the temperatures over 120 degrees and sleep was almost impossible to catch if you didn't sleep in front an AC.

The graveyard shift was back in the ring, ready to take up with whatever the night might bring to them. Usually on days like this there was plenty of work to do, people snapped much more easily with the heat. And it seemed like this when Grissom entered the room with a lot of papers in his hand.

"Catherine, there's 419 in Henderson for you, take Warrick with you. Nick, you go to the Bellagio, somebody tried to rob one of the shops, Sara, a 419 in the desert, take Greg with you."

"What about you?" Catherine asked.

"I've got a possible 419 at Lake Mead. It was a crazy hot day, people died like crazy."

"They all had crazy help for dying too, I guess." Greg mumbled and followed Sara. "What do you want me to do?"

"Get your kit, I'l drive."

"M'kay." He knew there was no point in argueing with the brown haired CSI. He got his kit and came down to the Denali.

"I like cases in the desert." Greg said. "Does that sound weird?"

"No more than all the other things you usually say." Sara grinned.

"Hey be nice to me, I'll be out with you in the desert, watching the stars above us…it would be like a date."

"If you're ideal idea of having a first date is being in the desert, next to a db, I'm very happy I never went on a date with you."

"Maybe the db isn't on my list for first dates, but the deserts and the stars are."

"So, who is she?"

"Who?" Sara could feel her coworker and friend flushed.

"Yeah, who do you have in mind for your hot desert date? Do I know her?"

"Uhm…what makes you think…"

"Greg, I'm an investigator, I know some things. Who?"

"Not your business." Greg tried to sound definitely to avoid further questions. Sara just started laughing.

"No worries, I'm gonna find out later."

"Mind you own business."

"You are my business, Hon." She send him a grin and his face became even redder than before. If she didn't know better, she'd think she was Greg's date but they were beyond that point.

"Did you manage to get any sleep?" She tried to change the topic.

"Barely, it was too warm and my AC is broken. You?"

"A couple of hours, I had to be back in the lab by three, Wendy called with the DNA results of my last case."

"Any luck?"

"At five I signed, sealed and delivered all boxes downstairs, case is solved and closed. A bad girl will be in jail for a few years."

"That was fast."

"Well, stupidity is useful for us. You don't rob a jewely's shop and go to the next one to sell your goods only 24 hours later."

"No, you should be smarter."

"Yeah, she saved me a few hours. We had enough evidence to get her for the robbery tonight but this way it was even faster. I love cases like that."

"Let's see if we can repeat that with this case." Sara saw the blue and red lights of police cars and slowed down. Time to find out what was waiting for them in the desert.

With their flashlights and kits in their hands Greg and Sara walked over to the officers.

"What do we have got, detective?" Sara asked.

"DB, male, Caucasian and uhm…have a look for yourselves." Sofia Curtis, the former CSI and now detective, was on scene.

Sara raised and eyebrow. Normally the blonde was never short of description of a crime scene and being a former CSI, she was quite good at it.

Greg and Sara walked slowly over to a naked body, which was visible under big lights, trying not to destroy any evidence and traces.

"What is that?" Sara couldn't take her eyes from the dead body. Yes, he was a male, yes he was Caucasian and he was...what the hell was he? Was he even human?"

"Sara, do you also see wings on his back?" Greg asked cautious.

"I freaking fucking do." Sara bent down to the upper body of the man. She was very tempted to touch what she saw. It looked like feathers.

"Eagle." Sara mumbled.

"What?"

"These feathers look like they belong to an eagle."

"What is a man doing with feathers of an eagle on his back in the middle of the desert?"

"Don't they say everything is possible in Vegas?" Sofia was suddenly behind them.

"As far as I know, even in Vegas you don't breed birds and human."

"Some of the Show Girls…" Greg started and stopped as soon as he got Sara's glimpse.

"Coroner is almost here, I just called for him."

"Good. Who found him?"

"A guy who wanted to see some kind of asteroid. He's with one of the officers." Sofia took another look at the body. "Do you think he fell from heaven?"

"Are you kidding me?" Sara looked at the detective in disbelief. Could she really believe the man flew from whereever to here and dropped dead?

"There're no traces of tires anywhere, I checked it already. No boot marks so far."

"How long have you been here, Curtis?"

"Half an hour before you guys arrived. Wanna give me some trouble for securing the crime scene and looking for evidence?" Sofia's voice was too sweet to be kind, Greg could feel a chili running down his spine. Was a fight between Sara and Sofia about to start? If so, he didn't want to be in the middle of it. He knew the relationship between the two women were difficult, a time ago, they seemed to get along fine now but Sofia's voice sounded dangerous to him.

"No, I was only wondering how long you were waiting for us. I know you knew what you're doing."

Greg sighed quietly. Thanks for giving in, Sara. The danger was gone, there would be no fight.

Also to his relief he saw David, the assistant coroner coming over.

"Sorry I'm late. The wife took me out for dinner."

"Hell I bet she wasn't pleased you had to leave." Greg grinned in sympathy.

"Oh, she was fine. I have to tell her every detail later…" David took a look at the body and froze. "She'll love this story. What is that?"

"A bird – man." Greg said simply.

"Looks like." David took a closer look at the wings. "Eagle?"

"That's what I guessed." Sara said.

"How can he have feathers of an eagle?"

"That's our job to find out, Super-Dave. Body temperature?" Sofia didn't want to rush but it got cold.

"Oh, yes." David got his thermometer and took the liver temperature. "From the temperature I'd say he's around ten hours dead. That puts him in the heat of the midday sun. I can tell you more after the autopsy."

"COD?"

"I can't see anything so far. Sara, Greg, can we turn him?"

"Absolutely!" Both of the CSI wanted to see how the feather ended up on the dead man.

Carefully they moved the body.

"Oh my goodness." Greg starred at the back of the man. It looked like the feather really grew out of his back on both sides.

"I thought it might be a costume." The young CSI shock his head.

"Whatever it is, it's extraordinary." David waved to two men with a stretcher. "I'll take him to Doc Robins."

"We're gonna try look for evidence." With one last look at the man, Sara and Greg started to look for evidence. As Sofia had told them, there were no boot prints, no traces of a car stopping by, nothing. It really seemed like the man dropped from heaven.

Greg walked to the man who found the body to ask him a few questions.

"Maximum ride."

"Whoa." Sara jumped. "Fuck, Sofia, don't do that." Sara had wandered too far from the crime scene, and was almost a few hundred yards away from it, desperate to find something that could tell her how the man got there.

"Easy Sara, I'm here to watch your back. You shouldn't leave the scene without telling anybody. If it wasn't for your flashlight, I wouldn't know you're here. Which also means, anybody else can see you from whereever."

"Make some noise the next time."

"Sorry."

"And what do you mean by maximum ride?" Sara got up and stretched her back. There were no signs of cars, trucks, horses, people or anything taht could have carried a dead body to the scene. On the other hand, it was windy in the desert today, traces were most likely gone with the wind, a few minutes and the sand would have looked like nobody had been here before. That's why she took off, hoping to find a hint somewhere in a sheltered place.

"It's a science fiction or fantasy story by James Patterson. The main character, Max, is a girl genetically altered with bird DNA. She has got wings and can fly. I read one book of the serie, it's usually not my genre but it was interesting."

"Like you said it's fantasy, we're in reality. Do you really thing there's something like..."

"Human birds?"

"Yes." Sara sighed. There are no such things like human birds, that was crazy. She was sure, Doc Robins would find an easy and logical explanation for everything. All Sara had to do was to find out how and who put this man here.

"I know you're a scientist through and through but don't you ever doubt?"

"No I don't. If I would, that would mean evidence isn't real, isn't telling the truth. But evidence never lies."

"Says Grissom."

"Every scientist will say that."

Sofia cocked her head. "I believe in things above our science."

"You're chasing demons on a full moon night?"

"We both had a werewolf case, remember?"

"A genetic…" Sara began.

"I know. I'm just saying, sometimes things can be…more than ordinary. Come on, let's get back, you're too far away already. If the wind had blown away every trace at the scene, it would have it here as well."

"Shall I watch your back?" Sara offered and continued when Sofia looked blankly at her. "Just in case a vampire flies along and decides to have you as a midnight snack."

"Believe me, Sara, I'm more scared of you behind me than a vampire." Sofia grinned.

"I won't take that personally."

They walked in silence back to the scene.

"Got anything?" Sara asked Greg.

"Nothing. No traces, nothing. The man couldn't help neither. He saw the db, called it in and stayed a few yards away, in case he had to chase away coyotes. He said he never touched the body. He guessed when somebody fell of the sky, he'll be dead."

"He was right – whoever the man ended up here."

"Do you think he might be…"

"Greg, if you start to talk about fantasy book or movies or both, talk to Sofia. Maybe the two of you can go and hunt a gremlin."

"I love that movie." Sofia laughed. "You know at the end of the rainbow there's a leprechaun with a pot of gold."

"Only in Ireland. Greg, let's go back to the lab and see what the doc has for us."

"I'll follow you guys."

"Now that's Sofia, is worse than having an angel of revenge on our tail."

"Bite me, Sidle."

"I am not a vampire."


	2. Chapter 2

"What do you have for us, Doc?" Sara had - with rolling eyes - listened to Greg's story about their case. By now all their colleagues have heard about the bird man, the most unusual case this year. But it was Vegas, and Sara wouldn't be surprised if there was another case tomorrow even more unusual than this one.

"Feathers." Doc Robins handed the a bag with feathers. "My guess is they're from an eagle."

"That was our guess too, I'll send them to traces." Sara took a look at the open body. Heart, liver, kidney, everything looked human.

"Yes, he is human." The doc seemed to have read Sara's mind. "Nothing unusual about his organs."

"So from the front he's a perfect human…"

"But when we turn him, he's special, yes. Would you give me a hand?" They turned the dead body.

"No more feathers."

"And something else is missing."

"Skin." Sara bent down over the upper back of the man.

"Yes, somebody cut off two pieces of skin. These wounds." He pointed on two wounds on the back. "Are made by something very sharp, probably a scalpel. That's how the feathers were connected to the body. Someone must have shot an eagle, cut off the wings and put each wing on each side of this man. Not in the easy way, like gluing it onto back. No he, she or attached the wings to the skeletal system. They were actually there where the bladebones meet the spine, tied to them with medical yarn."

"So these wings are definitely manmade?"

"Yes. I'm sorry, your bird man is not really a bird man, he's only a man with feathers that don't belong to him."

"To adorn yourself with borrowed feathers is a quite common human behavior." Sara said dryly.

"In this case I don't think he wanted it that way."

"Was turning him to a bird man the COD?"

"No, he died of a broken neck."

"So he fell from the sky?" Greg had been quiet the whole time, the last sentence gave him new hope for his extraordinary case. Sara rolled her eyes.

"If he did then because somebody threw him out of a plane or a helicopter. He wasn't alive when he got his wings, so he could never use them for a little fly around."

"Oh."

"You're looking for a human who killed a human to make him look like a bird man."

"With other words, we're looking for somebody crazy."

"Yes."

"Thanks God we're in Vegas, we won't be short of suspects." Sara sighed. No traces, no help from the ME, no idea where to start.

"Found something new?" Sofia walked into the lab. Sara looked up and shook her head. She had worked on a few fibers but nothing had come up as a lead.

"No, at the moment, he fell from heaven."

"Didn't you guys have once a case like that?" Sofia leaned against the table. "With a man in a tree?"

"Yeah." Sara looked surprised at Sofia. "How do you…?"

"I follow all interesting cases. Or the boy in the church."

"He was making this crazy video for the web page."

"Yeah. So maybe we have to look further away to find out how he ended up where he ended up."

"When I went further away you told me off."

"Because you were on your own. I can't do my job proper when you leave without telling me and I hate it when I can't do a good job."

"All for the job."

"Sure. So, we gonna go out?"

"What?" Sara looked horrified at the blonde.

"The crime scene? To find whatever made him end up in the middle of nowhere."

"Uhm, yes." Sara blushed and got up quickly to leave the room before Sofia could say anything else.

The detective stayed for a few seconds, trying to remember what she had said to get this reaction. Did Sara think..? Sofia chuckled. She should have a serious conversation with Sara Sidle if she had thoughts of what Sofia was thinking, she had been thinking. With an amused smile and a twinkle in her eyes she followed the csi.

Sara had changed into her vest and had her kit in her hands when Sofia met her in the car park.

"I'll drive." The detective made the decision. "Where do we go to?"

"Well, let's forget for a second you're a detective and remember the time as a csi…"

"What's that supposed to mean?" Forget that you're a detective? How was Sofia supposed to forget that? And then remember the time when you were a csi. Every time she acted like a csi she got told off and it was usually Sara who told her off.

"Just think. We have the body lying on the ground, facing the sky. Now if he was…sent to heaven by a slingshot it's likely this one is, or was, standing in head or feet direction."

"Not if he turned while he was flying."

"Don't make it complicated."

"I think like a csi, as you told me."

"Okay, how far can they reach? Average?"

"I have no idea. You're the geek, you should know."

"There's no limit anymore. But I think, if somebody used one to throw this guy away, there are traces. It will be heavy, even with the wind, we might be able to find something."

"Yeah, I hope so. Sun's coming up." Sofia took a second the watch the sunrise. To her, the sunrise was more beautiful than the sunset. "Shouldn't there be any signs on his body when he was…made to fly this way?"

"He was dead before he flew, so there was no need to restrain him. But yeah, there should have been traces of wood."

"So we're looking for a modern one, no wood, probably steel."

"Plastic, rubber band. I used to make mine with rubber band, easy and good."

"Why did you…?"

"An experiment. I shot little weights outside in the garden to find out, how much weight flies how far with which rubber band."

"Did you ever play something…normal?"

"And what is normal?"

"I don't know…Monopoly? Hide and seek?"

"No."

"I'm not surprised."

"And what's that supposed to mean?"

"You're too much a geek."

"Just because I'm a scientist and I love my job it doesn't mean there's nothing else for me in my life."

"Uh-hum."

"Just...concentrate on the case." Sara closed her eyes and tried to control her breathing. What was it that Sofia Curtis could make her angry this easily? Probably without wanting it. The only person who could do that to her was Catherine, that's why their relationship had been difficult for the first couple of months. But even with her Sara was fine now.

But Sofia? It started when she was flirting with Grissom. Sara was jealous, without a doubt. There was a without a question beautiful young woman, who was interested in Grissom and he didn't do anything to show her, he wasn't interested. Maybe he was, which makes the case even worse. Anyway, Sara managed to kick Sofia out of Grissom's head – that is IF she ever was in there – and became his love interest. She had Grissom, so she should be fine with the detective.

Her mobile rang.

"Sidle."

"Sara, where are you?" Talking about the devil…

"Grissom. I'm on my way back to the crime scene, maybe there's something further away, you know like a slingshot, that threw the man to where we found him."

"Greg's here."

"I know, he's trying to find out who the bird man is."

"Well I hope you're not out there on your own."

"No, I'm not. Sofia is with me." Sara rolled her eyes with a smile. Yes Grissom worried about her. It didn't work out with them, they had two years together, they were in love but at one point it wasn't enough anymore. They were too alike. A thing that comforted both first but after all these months, it had made their relationship…she wouldn't say boring but it broke it. Now they were friends. Sara never thought it was possible to be friends with somebody she was involved with, but it worked out fine. And because they hadn't told anybody about their relationship it was like before. So maybe she should rephrase her thoughts of Grissom and don't call him a devil: Talk of an angel and you'll hear the fluttering of it's wings. That even fit to her case.

"Don't stay out to long, Ecklie has an eye on your overtime."

"Ecklie should just…mind more important things." Sara stopped herself from swearing.

"We both know that he won't. Let me know if you find something. If not, I'll see you in the evening. Clock out before lunch."

"Did you say the last sentence as my supervisor?"

"Both."

"Oh." She could handle ignoring her friend, she could even handle to ignore her supervisor but both together? It has to be a very good reason.

"Bye."

"See you tonight." Sara switched her phone off.

"See you tonight? Hot date?" Sofia grinned.

"I work nightshifts, I see my coworker in the evening."

"Grissom?"

"Yeah."

"He's okay with us being here?"

"Sure. He was worried I had taken off alone."

"I wonder how he can think something like that?" Sofia teased.

"He knows me too good."

"Seems like he doesn't know me well enough. I won't let you go alone to a crime scene."

"If I leave the lab without telling you, there'd be nothing you could do. Believe me, if I want to be anywhere alone, I'd find a way." She didn't need a babysitter. She didn't mind having somebody around, she knew it was the rule and hey, if there had been an officer on scene years ago, Sara would be still in San Francisco because Holly Gribbs would be still alive. Or they would be both working in Vegas.

"I'd never doubt that, Sara."

Sofia stopped the car. They were on the street, about half a mile away from they've found the body.

"What now?"

"We can go on this road, if there was something like a slingshot, it's sure to be heavy. Much easier to use it from a sealed road."

"Which means, we won't find any traces."

"You'll never know. Half a mile?"

"Limit. I mean, the further it can shot, the bigger it is. If somebody with a huge slingshot drives around, he'll be noticed. I could ask traffic…"

"Do it." They would have heard by now if somebody reported a slingshot, but it was better to make sure.

Sara took her binoculars and started to search the area for any evidence. Now in daytime it was much easier to see.

Sofia drove half a mile up the street and turned then off road.

They drove a circle around the crime scene, nothing came in their eyes A make a second round another quarter of a mile closer to the scene followed.

"Let's get back to the scene, maybe we'll see something in day light."

"Then you'll have two officers by your side."

"You left one there?"

"I thought you might want to come back in day light."

"Maybe we're lucky."

Sofia stopped the car next to a police car. She send the officer away for a break and followed Sara.

"Can you lie down where the man was?" Sara asked Sofia.

"Why?"

"I can think better if I see what I'm thinking of. A better conclusion with a visible picture."

"When you think I'll lie in the sand, ruin my suit only for your private pleasure, you're wrong. Lie down yourself." Sofia smirked.

"Okay." Sara lay down where the body was found. They had searched around the area, had taken the sand in, nothing so far. She closed her eyes. How could somebody end up here without any signs of transport? If he was shot by a slingshot, there would have been any traces of the crash on the sand. You don't fall after a long flight on sand like on velvet. Doc Robins didn't say anything about any bruises or broken bones. A crash breaks bones. Consequently the body didn't fly here.

What was if he was slowly left down from a helicopter? Having a big rubber band around the body, go down until the body touches the earth, lost the rubber and fly away. But then there should be traces of the rubber. Maybe the strong wind blew them away. Marks on the body? If the rubber was placed around the body only seconds before it was sent down, maybe it was possible to do it without leaving any traces. Traces of rubber? They hadn't looked for that, maybe they should pay more attention to the back. They were so fascinated by the wings…

"You're comfortable there?"

Has anyone ever told Sofia that she could be a pain in the ass?

"I offered you this place."

"If you wanna have a snooze, I'll bring you back to the city."

"I'm thinking."

"Sure." It wasn't that Sofia was annoyed with Sara, she had watched her lying down for a while, when the csi didn't move and made no intention to leave, she thought, Sara had fallen asleep. Tiredness was definitely crawling into Sofia's body.

"You know, our idea with the slingshot was bullshit. If he had been flying, Doc Robins would have told us about major bruises or broken bones. Should have thought about that earlier, we wasted time on that. I was thinking maybe whoever left him here took a helicopter, you go down slowly, wrap a rubber band or something soft, that doesn't leave traces easily and as soon as the body hits the ground, you'll get your rubber band or whatever back in the helicopter and off you go."

"Any traces of rubber band on his back?"

"We haven't look for them, we were too interested in the wings."

"I'm still interested in his wings."

"So am I."

„You finished your...thinking time?"

"Yes." Sara took Sofia's hand and the detective pulled the investigator back on her feet.

"So we went here and got nothing?"

"Imagine this: Dave and Mary where sitting in their family room one night Dave was watching tv and his wife Mary was reading All of a sudden the power went out Dave decided to go bed but Mary kept on reading How?"

"What?" Sofia looked blank at Sara.

"How could she go on reading?"

"I don't know. A flashlight? What does this have to do with our case?"

"Our case seems to be impossible, I try to find answers for the impossible, and no, it's not a flashlight."

"Okay, what is it?"

"She's blind."

"So if we were blind we could see the answer?"

"I got some answers from being blind. Whoever got him here, had no heavy vehicle, put him on the sand softly, when he took the airway, he isn't alone. The sealed road is a half a mile away, the body was around one-sixty pounds, you don't carry that in death weight for such a long distance."

"So, how do you do it?" They went back in the car.

"How would I do it?" Sara closed her eyes again. "I'd have him on a plastic foil, the strong ones you see at construction sites, drive to here, park the car on the sealed road and carry him here with a friend."

"And if you're alone?"

"I can't carry him…I don't know."

"So we're most likely looking for two people."

"I'd say so." She had no idea how to do the dumping alone without any technical help. This case was strange, it started strange with the wings on the body and it became weirder and weirder with every hour.

"Lab, home or coffee?"

"I beg your pardon?" Sara had lost herself in her thoughts and didn't realize that Sofia was talking to her.

"Do you want to go back to the lab, home or get a coffee?"

Sara had a look at her watch. It was eight o'clock, she have been on duty for twelve hours, she had to think about her overtime and there was nothing she could do right now.

"I need my car otherwise I can't go to work tonight." Which meant, they had to go through the whole city, and it would be rush hour by the time they'd be there…

"I bring you home and pick you up tonight." Sofia's thoughts were with the rush hour too. Why make everything complicated if they could have it easy?

"You're sure?"

"You're living…what? Five minutes away? I guess I can handle that, yes. Or are you scared that I find exactly out where you live? That I know which door is yours."

"You're a detective, you can find that out in a minute if you wanted."

"I know." Sofia smiled and turned on the radio. Little Richards and 'You make me wanna shout' were on and out of the blue Sofia started to sing to the song.

"Oh my god, I'm in a car with a lunatic."

"It's called being human, Sidle. Couldn't hurt if you'd be a human every now and then."

"Why am I not human?"

"Don't know, you don't act human…you're…well, working. What do you when you're not working?"

"What?" What did that mean? What are you doing when you're not working? Sara worked, she slept and went back to work. Since she and Grissom weren't together anymore, she spent a lot of times with books, reading forensic magazines, maybe going out in the desert for a hike.

"Do you go out for dancing? Any sport? Dating?"

"It's none of your business if I date or not." Who did Sofia think she is asking Sara about her private life. They weren't friends, they were…they weren't even coworkers anymore, they just happened to end up on the same case. Okay, maybe they were still coworkers. But not friends. She could never be friends with Sofia. That was…impossible.

"Dancing? Sport?" Sofia ignored simply that Sara had snapped at her. She wouldn't expect anything else from the brunette. Sara was famous for her secret private life. In Sofia's mind, if there weren't any clues about what somebody did in his or her private time, this person didn't have a private life.

"I go hiking in the desert."

"Alone?"

"Yes, alone."

"Do you have a problem with people?"

"Only if they annoy me."

"Is there anybody who doesn't annoy you? Besides Grissom, coz we know, Grissom is above us all."

Now it was Sara who ignored a comment. She wouldn't talk about Grissom and what he meant to her. With nobody.

"I quite like the pizza delivery guy. He says hello, takes the money, says goodbye and is gone. I wish more people would be like him."

Sofia started laughing. That was so typical Sara.

"What?"

"You're so anti-social."

"I like to have some time for myself."

"Some time?"

"Most of the time I'm working, I'm not working alone. As you can see, I'm here with you, not alone. I'm with a human."

"And much more would you prefer to be alone in the car right now? How annoyed were you when I said, we should go back to the scene together? How come, Grissom thinks, you'd take off alone?"

"My concentration is much better when I'm alone and it's quiet." Sara grumbled.

"I'd like to see you drunk on a party, dancing on a table, singing out loud."

"Will never happen." What an awful thought.

"I know, but I'd like to see it. Maybe if we make you drunk on Christmas…"

"I gonna work Christmas and I don't drink alcohol."

"No alcohol, no parties, pizza delivered by a mute guy…"

"Why do we have to talk about my life? Why not about the case?"

"We're off the clock now."

"Fine, change the topic."

"Wanna go for a coffee?"

"Wait a minute. You're obviously annoying me, you know that, and you enjoy that. And you ask me if I want to have coffee with you so that you can go on doing these things? Are you kidding me?"

"I'll buy, no need to talk about your private life."

"Not today."

"I usually don't offer one thing twice." Sofia smiled.

"In that case I've to live with that."

"You'll be missing something out."

"Maybe. But my head needs a rest."

"Tell your head I gonna pick it and the rest of you up at six, sharp." Sofia stopped in front of Sara's apartment. "Should something come up regards the case so that we've to be back earlier, I'll call you or you can give me a call."

"Thanks for driving." Sara opened the door quickly.

"It was my pleasure." Sofia grinned. Well, she was probably the only one, but she had some fun on her way back home. Asking Sara private things could be very entertaining.


	3. Chapter 3

**Wednesday night / morning**

"I checked the back of our bird man again." Doc Robins went from his Jane Doe to Sara's and Greg's John Doe, simply called birdman.

"There were no visible traces, I took samples of his back, send them to traces. To your idea with the rubber bands." He looked at Sara. She had told him her ideas that were running through her head in the early morning.

"If he was brought to the desert with a helicopter and let down with a rubber band, I couldn't see any evidence of that. It must have been a big rubber band to carry him, quite wide too otherwise it cuts itself in to body. What you said about the foil, maybe he was on one, in a trunk of a car or hidden on a pick up, the murderer drives to the dump place, drags the body on the foil over where you found it and leaves. No tire marks because he was on the street, the dragging marks are gone with the wind."

"Interesting idea, Doc."

"I'm quite fascinated by this man."

"We all are." Greg looked at Sara. "Let's got to Hodges, see what he has for us."

"Smug and arrogant comments."

"That's for sure." Greg grinned and walked with Sara to David Hodges.

"You mix a human DNA with a bird DNA, what do you need?" The lab rat greeted them in his usual arrogant voice.

"A talented fantasy writer" Sara answered bored.

"What do you not need?"

"You, Hodges. Like for most situations in life." Greg said dryly and got a smile from Sara. Yes, Greg was a fast learner, no wonder she loved to work with him.

"I'll pretend I didn't hear that. Your birdman had a lot of sand on his back. Unfortunately nobody had a closer look for traces on his back before we got washed, I can understand, with the sight of the feathers."

"Hodges, get to the point." Sara cut the man off. She wasn't here for a long speech she wanted fast answers.

"There's a lot of desert sand on his back, just like the sand you took as a sample. But I managed to find something else." He stopped to make it more exciting.

"If you don't tell us on three what you've found I'll tar and feather you." Greg threatened.

"You spend too much time with her." Hodges wrinkled his nose. "I found some dust, not that kind of dust you find in the desert, it comes from construction sides."

"There're hundreds of them in Vegas. Can you narrow it down?"

"No."

"Great, thanks."

"It was my pleasure."

"Shall I call Sofia?" Greg offered.

"Yeah, call her over. I'll go and talk to Grissom."

Sara went to the office of her supervisor, knocked on the door and waited until Grissom looked up.

"Sara, come in."

"Hey Gil, I just wanted to give you an update on our case." She sat in front of his desk.

"You've got a lead?"

"Yes and no. Hodges found dust from a construction side."

"If you would be in a small town it would be a case breaker…" Gil smiled. Hodges always wanted to know, if he found the case breaker.

"…but we are in Vegas, here are more construction sides than anything else" Sara completed his sentence.

"Yes."

"I hope we would get at least a little help." She closed her eyes for a short moment. The headache was back.

"You alright?" Although they weren't together anymore, Gil still cared a lot for his former girlfriend and he could see, that she wasn't good.

"A little headache, nothing serious. Don't you dare to send me home because of this." She smiled.

"I'd never do that. What do you plan to do next?"

"Greg's calling Sofia, I think she'll come in later. I'll try to find out how many construction sides we have in Vegas."

"Doc Robins didn't find any dust in the wound?"

"No."

"So he got his wings probably not at a construction side. Whoever did that to the man, has at least a little bit of medical skills, a doctor, a medicine student, a nurse. The dust doesn't mean the body was from a construction side, it could be wrapped up in a foil, that was used on one."

"A murderer with medical skills, living not too far away from a construction side or having a spouse, son working on one."

"That all won't help much."

"No, but it's the little things that add up to one big thing." Sara and Gil grinned. That was a thing he had told her years ago. You collect a lot of little things and in the end you had one big thing. It's like solving a jigsaw, you find piece after piece, all don't show you what you have but at the end, you're able to see the whole picture.

Sara stood up to leave.

"Sara?"

"Yes?" She turned around.

"There's a seminar next month in Utah about criminal forensic, do you want to go?"

"Sure, who's coming with me?"

"I'm a speaker there. That okay for you?"

"Sure." She smiled. There were no hard feeling, she still felt comfortable around him, no reason not to go to a seminar with him. They were friends, friends could do that.

"Okay, just one thing?"

"What?"

He smirked. "Stop collecting overtime, otherwise Ecklie won't let you go. Try to go home on time the next weeks, or at least, don't go over five hours…per week."

"Gil…"

"I know you don't like it, but we both know Ecklie. Last chance to change your mind about the seminar."

"I'll be on my way home on time…if there's no break through in the case."

"You'll drive?"

"You bet." She laughed and left. Who would have thought she could have a very close friendship with one of her former lover? She had always respected Gil, she had always adored his work, there's no reason why that should have changed after their separation.

To her surprise Sofia was already with Greg.

"Hey."

"Hey yourself, I've got a name for our bird man." Sofia handed a file to Sara.

"Jared Joston, thirty, from Vegas. What did he do?"

"A few parking tickets, a few speeding tickets and he was with a group of teenager, that robbed a liquor shop. He was just a follower, got some community service and parole, was never arrested or got in any trouble again. Seems like that one time was enough for him. He was a nurse."

"A nurse?" Sara was interested.

"A nursery nurse."

"He's a guy."

"They can be kindergarten teachers too."

"Looks like. What's with his family?"

"Parents moved to Florida years ago, I called them. No siblings. No partner."

"We'll go to his last address?"

"That's why I'm here. And of course Greggo called me."

"My pleasure."

"What's about the construction side?" Sara ignored the fact that Sofia called Greg Greggo. Could she be his crush? Sara didn't try to find out who Greg's secret crush was since they had the new case. Was it the detective? Was she asking Sara all these private question because she wanted to find out how Sara stood to Greg? Was it a mutual flirting? Was Sofia Greg's crush and the blonde was aware of that, played a little bit with him? Or was she interested in Greg? Sara knew, Greg was watching Sofia whenever the blonde was around, but so did a lot of guys and Greg watched a lot of women.

"I'll do that later too. But there're hundreds of construction sites in Vegas. It will take hours to find them all."

"You're the detective, go and detect."

"Funny Sidle, very funny."

"Grissom and I agree on the fact that whoever gave the wings to our victim must have some medical skills."

"Is that supposed to narrow my search down?"

"No, that's supposed to be another big search for you. Doctors, nurses, medical students, you gonna meet so many interesting people, Curtis."

"I'll take you with me to each of them. Just to share to fun."

"Why am I the one who has to stay in the lab?" Greg complained.

"Coz you were a lab rat and you don't rip off Hodges balls and stuck them in his mouth when he's too smug, too arrogant and too much himself." Sara smirked.

"Maybe if you would do that he'd be not that big pain in the ass anymore."

"And I'd lose my job. Want that?"

"No."

"See. You can start with the construction side, have a look for doctors, nurses, medical students with a record, relatives that work on construction sides or who lives not too far away from one either."

"Lovely, thanks for that job, Sara."

"You'll be alright." Sara took her kit. "Oh and Greg?"

"Yes?" He was ready to take another job that would bound him for hours in front of the computer and was likely a death end.

"Concentrate on construction sides that are not in use at the moment. It's easier to get a foil from there without that anybody noticing."

"Okay."

"See you later."

"Later."

Sara and Sofia left.

"Who's driving?" Sofia asked.

"Me. If you are as annoying as you were this morning, I'll kick you out of the car and you can take a black and white back."

"Ouch, you're unforgiving."

"That and worse." Sara started the car. "Where are we going?"

"Henderson, 267 Miller Road."

Without any more words Sara got the Denali out of the car park and on the street. She could have sent Greg out with Sofia to avoid the detective but she hated nights in the lab. Sitting for hours in front of a computer, knowing she was looking for the famous needle in a haystack, so the detective was the lesser evil.

"You've got a key for the flat?"

"No but I've called a locksmith."

The locksmith was waiting in front of the house. Sofia flashed her badge and ordered him to open the door. Within a few seconds the front door was open.

"Let me secure the flat first." She stopped Sara who rolled her eyes. The guy was dead, he lived alone, whoever killed him had enough time to come here, take whatever was worth taking and left. But if Sofia wanted to play hero cop.

"Okay, clear."

"Surprise." Sara mumbled. She entered the flat and was immediately in the living room. An old couch, a little table full of empty pizza boxes, an old TV, bookshelves, stereo. The kitchen was in the next room. Dinning area, full of newspapers, no dishes in the sink, the fridge was filled with juice, fruits, vegetables, bread.

"Hey Sara?" Sofia called from the living room.

"Yes?"

"Remember what I asked you yesterday? About the book."

Sara walked back to the living room. Sofia was standing in front of one of the bookshelves.

"Which book?"

"Maximum ride. James Patterson."

"Oh, the bird thing."

"Ninety-eight percent human, two percent bird. Look what he's been reading. All books of this series and some others that look like they're about this topic. He has a lot of DNA and bird books in here."

Sara took a closer look at the books and took one of the books out, Sofia was talking about.

"Themes from Patterson's popular adult titles _When the Wind Blows_ and _The Lake House_ waft through this YA thriller, the author's first in the genre. Wood stars as Maximum Ride, 14-year-old leader of a band of kids who have escaped the lab where they were bred as 98% human and 2% bird (wings being a key component) and developed a variety of other-worldly talents. In Patterson's unusual universe, Max and her young cohorts are soon forced to rescue one of their own—a girl named Angel—from a pack of mutant wolf-humans called Erasers. Wood nails Patterson's often adult-beyond-their-years dialogue with a jaded tone. But the result of this pairing makes Max sound more off-putting than cool or intriguing.

You read this one?"

"No, I read 'When the wind blows' I think. The book, where the children get out of the institution, they were held in."

"Looks like our victim was more into this series. You could read the rest, maybe you'll find a clue."

"Why me? Why not you? You're the csi."

"You're into this stuff."

"I'm not, I'm just open-minded."

"Whatever, he was obviously into birds and human. Maybe he thought, he can make a fantasy story become reality. I'm pretty sure you'll find enough people in the internet, who fancy Patterson's fantasy and would try to create a human bird."

"If you have the idea of creating a human bird, the wings have to be bigger. An eagle is much smaller than a human, so you need something that can fly and is the size of a human and the wings of this bird."

"Albatross?" Animals were not Sofia's favorite past time.

"Big but I don't think big enough. An emu is big, it is big enough but on the other hand site, they don't fly."

"That leads us to the conclusion, humans can't fly because their weight is too big."

"So how did Patterson's humans fly?"

"It was in their DNA, the wings grew with the children, just like arms and legs do…do you think somebody is already mixing up human DNA with bird DNA?"

"I really don't want to know what crazy experiments are going on on this planet. People scare me."

"Maybe Jared Joston was the first test for our Doc Bird. He tried to connect wings to Jared, it didn't work out now he'll try it with DNA."

"Was Joston reported missing?"

"Two days ago."

"That was Tuesday. Let's say he didn't go to work on Monday, they report him on Tuesday missing. Plus two additional days of the weekend, he might have been kidnapped on Friday and nobody took notice until Tuesday. You've got an appointment with his work place?"

"Seven a.m. today. The first one I could get."

"Maybe they'll know a little bit more."

"Shall I bag the books?"

"Why not? Bag everything that has something to do with birds, human and how human can become birds." Sara sighed and went back to the kitchen. The food in the fridge came back to her mind. Fruits, vegetables, things birds would eat. No meat. She opened the cupboards. A lot of wheat, cereals, more bread. Was the victim trying to become a bird? Did he maybe ask somebody to give him wings? But that made no sense, he died before he had his wings. He had never a chance to enjoy them. Could you enjoy some wings of a dead eagle? How long would they stay on your back anyway? They were attached to the body with some medical yarn. But just because they are on the back, in the body, that doesn't mean, they're working. You can't glue a finger onto your hand if you cut it off. You needed to connect it with all the veins, the muscles, the skin.

"Got something?" Sofia was a few yards behind Sara.

"No."

"But?"

"Do you think we're looking for a killer with medical skills?"

"It sounded like that." Sofia watched Sara. She could see how the brain of the investigator was working and she tried to be patient until Sara was ready to share her thoughts. Not that easy for Sofia, she mumbled. She saw things, mumbled her thoughts quietly to get it better in her head, to find clues faster. Sara was the opposite.

The CSI turned and went to the bedroom without saying something.

Sofia rolled her eyes. Okay, Sara didn't want to share. She took the books she had bagged and brought them to the Denali. A birdman. In the book Sara had in her hand earlier was something written about wolf – humans. It seemed like they weren't talking about the ordinary werewolf. What could a wolf – human be? And would they find another human, maybe mixed with whatever of a wolf? Did somebody try to create a reality after a fantasy book?

She walked back in the flat and found Sara in the bedroom.

"No semen, no traces of a female in his life. I found some hairs, looked like his own, but I bagged it for DNA. More books about birds and human."

"Did he own any birds?"

"Nothing in the house suggests that."

"I gonna a have look outside."

"I'll come with you." Sara didn't know why but something in the house was creepy. She didn't like it when Sofia went out with the books, leaving her alone in the apartment. She tried not to think of it, tried to concentrate on her work but it was a relief when Sofia was back. No reason to tell her that, anyway.

They found a back door that brought them in the garden. A tree, a little bed and a huge shed. Locked.

"Wanna call the locksmith again?"

"No, I think we can handle that ourselves. Process the door so that I won't destroy any evidence."

"Yes, boss." Sara opened her kit. Sofia took her flashlight and moved it to the door so that Sara could see.

She took a few fingerprints, a few photos and stepped back.

"You gonna kick it in?"

"Like in TV? I live for moments like that, but no, I won't." Sofia took a lock pick from her pocket.

"Whoa, what's that, detective?"

"That's what happen when your mum is a cop and you want to piss her off by hanging out with the wrong kind of people. Brings you some trouble with the police, even more with your mum and some useful skills." She kneed down and a few seconds later the door was open. "No challenge."

"Does your boss know about your…special skills?"

"No but I bet Grissom knows all your special skills." Sara was thankful for that it was dark, she was very sure she flushed for a second or two. What does Sofia mean with that comment? What did she know about Sara and Grissom and the relationship they had? It was secret, they told nobody, and they were careful.

"Secure the scene." She tried to sound like she wasn't bothered by the comment.

"I will." Sofia took her gun and opened the door carefully. "LVPD, anybody in here?"

No answer. Her flashlight caught a light switch. The second the light was turned on, the two women see what was in the shed, a deafening noise started. There were birds all over the place. Small ones in cages you could buy at any shop. Big ones in a special cage, the victim must have built it himself.

"Shit." Sofia starred at the birds, trying not to cover her ears.

"I guess he had a bird or two." Sara ignored the noise and walked to the next cage. Four budgies were in that one.

"I'll call animal control."

"Wait!" Sara stopped Sofia.

"What?"

"First of all, you won't leave me alone in…this." Damn, why did she say that? She wasn't a pussy. But she really didn't want to be alone in here. "Second, I need your help. Now and quick."

"What for? You found something?"

"They're starving. There's no food, barely any water. We have to feed them."

"Isn't that against the rules? We're not supposed to…"

"They are alive, Sofia, they're suffering. I don't give a shit about the rules, they need food, and they need water. Now. Look in the cupboard, I bet there's food." Sara walked to the cupboard and found food. Without hesitation she took the first box, clearly for small domestic animals and threw a handful in the cage next to her. Sofia watched her going to the next cage and then moved. She took an empty bottle and filled it with water in the sink next to the door. Carefully that no bird could escape she filled up water bowls.

It took them almost five minutes to feed all the birds and provide water for them but after that it was almost quiet in the shed.

"Now you can call animal control from here and I'll have a look around." Sara took her kit. "I'll take the blame if anybody is pissed off because we fed them first."

"I can take responsibility for my own actions." Sofia took her cell phone. Animal control wouldn't be here until the morning, it was right what they did.

"Fuck!"

"What happened?" Sofia almost dropped the box of bird food when she heard Sara calling out.

"Just banged my head on a cage. It's not like I didn't have a headache already."

"You alright?"

"Yeah, I'll survive." Sofia stepped next to Sara, who was kneeling on the ground, collecting some feathers. "I didn't see an eagle, but maybe he had one and that one is gone because it was the other part of the human – bird – connection. I…"

"Sara, have a seat."

"What?"

"Have a seat." Sofia pointed on a chair in the corner.

"Why?"

"Would you please just do what I say? Just this one."

Sara closed the evidence bag and sat on the chair. Sofia stepped behind her.

"And now try to relax for a minute, close your eyes and think of…whatever, but not work, nothing related to work."

"What are you doing?" Sara didn't feel comfortable having the detective out of her sight.

"Shut up and relax." Sofia laid her hands on Sara's skull and began gently to move her fingers. She knew how awful it was to work with a headache, she had one herself. Maybe she could make Sara's disappear or at least make it lesser. With skilled fingers she moved from Sara's skull, to her forehead, to her neck. There were so many knots in Sara's neck and shoulder area, Sofia would need hours to make them disappear. No time for that, they could only take five minutes, that was all. This was still a murder investigation.

"Better?" She asked when she had worked her way back to the point where she'd started.

"Yes. Thanks." Sara turned around and gave Sofia a surprised look. "I didn't know you can do things like that."

"It's just a little massage, your body is full of tensions, I could spend two or three hours on it to lose everything up. You should relax more often, Sara. I'm surprised you've got only a headache with that back and neck."

"Where did you learn that?"

"My brother is a physio. I was his guinea pig, he practiced on me so that he could impress the girls later. I asked him to show me how to do it, he started to show me what I can do to myself, in case I've got a headache and then he started to show me the basic of massage. You can say, he had his school with tests, and he taught me all he learnt. I never took a course, never had an exam, but I think, it's alright for private use."

"It felt more than alright. Thank you."

"So your head is better?"

"It still hurts a little bit but yes, better."

"Good. I'll call an officer to wait here until animal control is here, when you're finished in here we can go back to the lab, bring the evidence in and go to the kindergarten."

"I promised Grissom to go home as soon as possible, means we should be as fast as possible."

"You promised to go home early?" Sofia raised an eyebrow.

"Ecklie is on his back because of my overtime and there's a seminar next month. If I want to join it, I can't collect more than five hours of overtime per week."

"You think you can do it?"

"Maybe. I might get a hobby for a few weeks." Sara grinned.

Sofia started laughing and called the department to send them an officer.


	4. Chapter 4

"Bird man had birds." Greg took some evidence bags.

"Yes, he had." Sara took herself some bags. They would all try to find out which feathers belong to which bird.

"I didn't see any eagle but that doesn't mean there wasn't one before. The feathers on the victim were from only one bird?"

"Yes, that's confirmed, so we can go straight to the long ones, were there many big birds?"

"No." Sara looked for her crime scene photos. The birds were small, average. She didn't see any big birds, but one cage was quite big, maybe it was built for an eagle. Could you keep other birds in a cage with an eagle? Or would it kill them?"

"How much do you know about eagles?" she asked Greg.

"Nothing? I was never interested in birds, it's not a topic you can impress girls with."

"But DNA and traces are?" Sara smirked.

"Would work on you, wouldn't it?"

"Greg, who's your secret sweet heart?"

"Who said there's a secret sweet heart?"

"You did."

"No, you assumed there is one."

Her mobile rang. She gave Greg a look that told him, she wasn't finish with him and the topic.

"Yes?"

"Traffic patrol found Joston's car." Sofia's voice came out of the mobile. "It's on the Strip."

"Any signs that it was stolen?"

"No. It's not too far away from a bus stop, he could just jump in a bus and go to wherever."

"Why would he take the bus when he has car?"

"Save the environment? He was a bird lover."

"Lame explanation."

"Come over, have a look at it and we'll have a better idea. Then we can have breakfast before we go to Joston' workplace."

"What about Greg?"

"He's welcome to join our breakfast meeting."

"We'll see. I'll be there in ten."

"Okay."

She closed her mobile and looked at Greg.

"What?"

"What do you think about breakfast later at a diner?"

"You buying?"

"I won't be going, it's just you and Sofia."

"What?" Her young friend looked at her with eyes wide open. "No way!"

"Greg?" Sara's voice was dangerous and sweet and Greg wished he could vanish immediately. He feld like a rabbit in front of a snake, preparing to face his death.

"Is it Sofia?"

"What?"

"Your little secret crush. Do you have a crush on Sofia?"

"Are you kidding me?"

"Why don't you want to have breakfast with her? Why do you look like I'm sending you on a deadly trip?"

"Because…she'd eat me alive! She's…a detective. She…she would crush me with two fingers while she has a cup of coffee in the other hand. No way I'd go…that I'd have breakfast with her alone. Especially not after she worked two shifts with you, she'll be full of aggression, I'll be nothing more than a little fly to her, she can crush me and leave me in the diner to die."

Sara started laughing out loud. She didn't know that Greg was scared of Sofia.

"She's playing the bad ass cop."

"She's playing it too well if you ask me. Have you ever watched her when she is interrogating a suspect? She eyes them down, she kills them with one look. I bet if nobody would watch her, there'd be blades coming out of her eyes, pinning the suspect on the wall and slowly cutting his skin apart until he confess and then she'll leave him there to slowly bleed out. She might be a cop but she's worse than the mafia. She moves through the department like a tiger, looking for her prey and I don't want to sit on a silver tray ready to be her breakfast. I wanna live!"

"Okay, so it's not Sofia."

"No."

"But if you don't tell me who it is, I make her believe it's her and just imagine what she'll do to you, Greggo." Sara's smile went from teasing to very, very mean.

"You wouldn't…"

"Don't bet on it. Who is your workplace sweet heart?"

"There's only one person in this department whom I ever wanted to date and that's you, Sara. Nobody else. Can we please change the topic?"

"We've finished the topic, I've got to go over to the bad ass cop, they've found Joston's car. You can stay in the safe lab, and I'll handle her."

"No breakfast."

"It will break her heart."

"I'll make sure I stay in the lab the next few days."

"Cute. Greg?"

"Yes?"

"You won't get a date with me, you know that after all these years. But maybe we can have breakfast together after we finished the case."

"All you want is to find out who my secret love is."

"Thanks for telling me there is one, Greggo." Sara blew a kiss to his deep red face. That was easy, she knew she would get a confession out of Greg by the end of the shift. That meant, for the next shift she could set a new goal for herself, finding out who Greg's secret love was.

"I drive." Sofia took her keys and didn't wait for Sara's respond.

"What if I want my own car?"

"Why would you want that?"

"To go home after shift?"

"I'll take you home."

Sara looked suspiciously at her. Sofia stopped, looked into Sara's face and laughed.

"Stop being that suspicious. If you really want, than I'll come back to here after we had a look at the car and you can get your car. It isn't on the way, but if it makes you happier, we can do that."

"That would be the second time in a row you drive me home."

"Don't worry, I don't kiss before the third date." Sofia started the car without a smile.

Sara's look went ice cold and she barely managed to sit on the passenger seat. "If you dare to come even close to me…"

"Sara, relax, we don't have coffee together, what kind of date would that be?"

"I don't date…you."

"You mean in like, you don't date women or you don't date just me?" Sofia hid a grin. This game was even more fun than having a suspect in custody and scaring them to death. Teasing Sara Sidle was better than playing good cop – bad cop with Jim. That made her wonder, why was she always the bad cop? Weren't women supposed to be the friendlier gender?

"You are a woman, you are you, so no matter what I say, it's always a no for you."

"If it's me, maybe I can change."

"Why would you wanna do that?"

"Maybe I'm desperate for a coffee?"

"I asked Greg if he wants to have breakfast with you but he's scared you'll make him being the breakfast. What did you do to him?"

"Me? To Greg? Nothing." Sofia was surprised. She liked the young csi, he has always been nice to her, even the first weeks, when she was on night shift as a csi. She enjoyed working with him and was still happy every time she saw his face on a crime scene.

"There must be something. He thinks, you're tiger, looking for prey when you're walking through the department. Although I think with your affinity for black clothes, it's more like a black panther."

"It's very interesting what you guys talk about when you're supposed to be working on a murder case."

"He's working on the feathers, but I doubt there's one from an eagle in the bag."

"Maybe the killer provided the eagle."

"Can you buy them? Don't you need a license to have an eagle as a domestic pet?"

"Maybe he went out in the mountains and shot one."

"It must have been a good shot, I didn't see any blood."

"The wings are in traces?"

"Yeah, Hodges will take care of them."

"At least they're in good hands."

"The rest of him is unfortunately quite annoying."

"Nobody is perfect."

"Really?" Sara turned to observe Sofia. "Where're your faults?"

"Thank you."

"What? What kind of answer is that?"

"Well, obviously my mistakes are so small that even one of the best investigator in the country can't see them, that's a compliment in my eyes."

"One of your MANY faults is that you're arrogant."

"Really?" Sofia smirked.

"And this smug smile is another one."

"What else?"

"You're too sure of yourself. Your superego is big enough for three, you walk around like you own the place, you're a pain in the ass, you can be as annoying as Hodges and you enjoy that, just like he does. You're playing with your bad cop image, you're luring guys into whatever you want them to do with your sex appeal just like Catherine does and you don't accept 'no' as an answer." Sara bit on her lip. She didn't mean to say all those things. That was what happened when somebody asked her what are his or her mistakes.

"I love that you're brutal honest, Sara."

"I didn't mean to say all these things…" Sara mumbled apologeticly. She had the feeling she went too far over the edge.

"I asked, you answered. Most of the things you said aren't that bad either."

Not that bad? Sara didn't say anything nice, as far as she could remember.

"I might have been a little bit too…"

"No you weren't. Want me to tell you all your mistakes?"

"I'm almost headache free, so no." No, she didn't want to know what Sofia thought was wrong with her. She didn't need to hear all her mistakes, she knew them.

"Okay."

That was too easy, Sara expected something more.

Lucky for her they arrived at their final destination. An old blue Ford was being watched by an officer.

"I'll take the fingerprints." Sara said not expecting a lot from this. The car parked on the Strip, chances were high, people who walked by, touched it. She got some prints from the front doors and the roof area around the driver's door.

"Will you use your special skill to open the car or shall we call a locksmith?" Sara teased.

"Neither I'll just open the door." Sofia grabbed the handle and opened the door.

"This car was open and nobody took it?" Sara was amazed.

"Nope, nobody was interested. It had tickets, I've got a notice from traffic, there should be at least four of them, the first one from Saturday. No tickets on or around the car, I guess, some friendly people took them away. Maybe they thoughts it's a police car. No other car could stay here so long without a ticket."

"A police car without a camera? Why would the police park a car on the Strip?"

"We do strange things, don't we?" Sofia grinned.

"You certainly do." Sara took some photos before she bent in the car to get more fingerprints.

"No wallet, only junk, some magazines." Sofia was on the other side and checked what was in front of the passenger seat. "A medical magazine. 'Your DNA and what it really can do'. Interesting. Do you have an evidence bag?"

Sara handed her a few bags.

"Thanks." She went on searching the junk. "Sara, is there anything birds don't eat as far as you know?"

"They eat fruits, veggies, birds of prey like eagles eat meat, why?"

"What was in the fridge? Was it stuff you would consider as possible food a bird would eat?"

"Yes." Curious about all these questions Sara's attention turned to Sofia. The blonde felt the look of the brunette on her and lifted with her glove protected hands a candy bar.

"Candy is not on the list of bird's favorite food. Maybe we've got something on our mystery Doc."

"Or it is simply a candy wrap from his job. He's working in a kindergarten, candy is definitely high on the favorite food list of children."

"There's no reason why he should have a child in his car."

"Maybe he gave it a lift, maybe it's a neighbor's child, maybe it is the killer." There were a few possibilities in Sara's opinion.

"I'll bag it. Got some more prints?"

"There're a few around the steering wheel, I can't tell if they belong to the same person."

"I'll have a look at the mess in the back and see what's in the trunk."

"You're working as a detective or as a csi?"

"Which would you prefer?" Sofia expected another snappy comment about her work, another fight about what she was supposed to do and which was Sara's business and she didn't want Sofia to do.

"Help yourself from the kit if you need anything."

Sofia held in for a second. Did Sara really say that? Was the csi okay with having Sofia working with her on the car?

"Move, you don't get paid for staring at me." Sara said dryly.

"I'm…surprised. You're alright with me working on the car?"

"Sofia, you're a detective, you were a csi, a good one. If you offer me to help me with the car so that we can make it on time to our appointment, why should I turn down that offer?"

"Because it's you and you usually don't like me working on your scene."

"I don't like detectives, officers, lieutenants or whoever working on my scene, playing csi. But you were one, you know what you're doing. So stop acting like a high school girl on a first date and open the damn trunk."

"High school girl on a first date? You're weird, Sidle." Sofia grinned and walked to the trunk. Okay, Sara could surprise her, she did it with her last sentence. With a crowbar she opened the trunk.

"Uhm, Sara?"

"Yes? I don't mind if you made some scratches, we probably can't use anything from the outside of this car in court anyway."

"That's not what I meant. Would you mind having a look at this? As the official csi."

"Official csi?" Sara moved her hair out of her face and came to Sofia.

"Oh."

"Does it look like an eagle to you?"

"It looks like an eagle without wings to me, yes." Sara moved her flashlight through the dead bird and the trunk. There was some blood.

"You bag, I'll give you light." Sofia said.

"A thing every vegetarian dreams of, bagging a dead bird."

"You want me to…"

"No, it's okay." Sara got a box out of the car. She could handle a dead bird, it was better than the meat experiment Grissom had let her do. The experiment that made her a vegetarian. She bagged the bird after taking various photos, took some examples of the blood, and bagged some clothes that were in the trunk.

"No gun."

"The bird got shot?"

"I'd say so, it looked like a gun shot wound. Did Joston own a gun?"

"I'll check it." Sofia didn't move, holding the flashlight for Sara.

"Hey Ladies, want a ride?" A biker stopped next to them.

"No, thanks, we're working here."

"You girls could work on me."

Sofia turned a little bit so that the guy could see her badge, which was attached to her belt.

"I'm gone." He took off as fast as possible.

"That's what happen when you stay on the strip, men think they can help you by helping themselves."

"I'm sure he thought that this is his lucky morning, two women who need his help, he can be the hero and we'll end up in his bed as a big thank you."

"He lost his interest quite fast."

"He saw your badge?"

"I guess so, all I did was turning a bit in his direction."

"The bad ass cop strikes again."

"Am I that scary?"

"No. Not to me."

"So why do you say no all the time when I offer you coffee?"

"All the time? That was only yesterday."

"And today."

"Shift isn't over."

"You wanna tell me, you haven't made your decision so far? I don't believe you're still thinking of it. You know, you'll say no."

"Don't try to read me, Curtis. I need some light, can I have your flashlight?"

"Sure."

Sara bent deeper in the trunk, looking in all the corners. Nothing jumped in her eyes that might help her. She had bagged all the things in the trunk so far and gave the flashlight back to Sofia.

"Let's see what's under here." She lifted the bottom of the trunk. All she found was an old, flat tire. No hidden evidence or a gun.

"Let's get the stuff back to the lab and let the guys bring the car in." Sara closed her kit.

"Ever watched an autopsy of an eagle?"

"No and I don't think I will. We don't have time for that." The sun was already coming up, if they wanted to be on time in the kindergarten, they had to hurry.

Sofia got them back to the lab in record time without breaking too many traffic rules. Together they carried all the new evidence to Greg.

"Something to keep you busy, Greggo." Sara grinned.

"You've got the eagle?"

"Yes, we do. Tell us about the autopsy, mouse. Meow." Sofia smirked and laughed at Greg's red face. She couldn't help herself, but she had to do that. If she was a dangerous black panther, Greg was her little mouse. She had asked the young csi out for breakfast, only to find out how he would try to get out of this invitation.

"I'll follow you." Sara got her car keys out of her pocket.

"No shared ride?"

"No need for it."

"Coward."

"Drive, panther."

"Grrrr." Sofia bared her teeth. Sara laughed and got in her car. It was time to find out what the people who knew Jared Joston said about him.


	5. Chapter 5

"Jared was a wonderful man." Mrs. Wittenheimer was an elderly woman, Sofia guessed her in her early sixties. "I can't believe somebody wanted to hurt him."

"Somebody did hurt him."

"Why?"

"We're trying to find that out. When was the last time you talked to him?"

"On Friday, when he left for the weekend."

"Did he mention any plans for the weekend?"

"No, not that I can remember."

"Do you know any of his friends? Did he have a girl friend?"

"No, he never mentioned anybody. I know he spent a lot of time reading, he was so smart, he read a lot of medicine stuff and he could explain it to the children. Where can you find a man who can explain to a four-year-old boy what DNA is? Jared could do that."

"Any other hobbies?"

"Birds. When he went out with the children, he could name every bird they saw and he could tell them everything about them. A few weeks ago we took the whole group into the park, Jared told them the name of every bird, told them what they eat, how they live. He was amazing, he could keep them fascinated about a little mockingbird for an hour."

"Did he have some birds?"

"Yes, he had a few. He told us sometimes stories about them. I really don't understand why anybody wants to hurt him, such a nice man."

"Was he in a club? Like when he was so fascinated about birds, did he go out and met other bird experts?"

"He never said so."

Sofia sighed quietly. The elderly woman really tried to help but she was no real help. It seemed like Jared Joston didn't involve his coworkers in his life. He told them about birds, his passion, showed his interest in DNA but that was all.

"Did Mr. Joston ever offer a lift to one of the children?" Sara stood the whole time silent in front of a window and watched the children outside. Now she turned around to get the answer to her question.

"No, the children get picked up by their parents. We take that very seriously. If you can't pick up your child and want a friend to pick it up, you have to call her in the morning, name the friend and the friend has to bring a photo i.d. before we let the child with him or her. None of the teacher is supposed to give the children a lift."

"Is not supposed to or isn't allowed to?"

"If there would be an emergency case of course a teacher can drive a child home, but I can't remember the last time that happened. If you're trying to say Jared was a …"

"We're not saying anything, Mrs. Wittenheimer." Sofia interrupted the woman.

"My question wasn't supposed to suggest that Mr. Joston was a pedophile or anything like that." Sara said calm. "It is just, we searched his house, he lived very…healthy…" She didn't want to say like a bird. "…and then we found some candy wrapper in his car. There was no other candy in his flat or on the premises. We were wondering if the candy came in the car through a child, he took home. Nothing more."

"No, he didn't do that. I'd know about that."

"He didn't eat candies here?"

"Any kind of sweets are prohibited in and around the kindergarten. We try to teach the children how to live and eat healthy."

"Did he talk about his family?"

"Not much. His parents are living in Florida, he visited them twice a year, they came over once or twice a year. As far as I know the relationship is good. Did you tell them…?"

"Yes, I did." Sara looked surprised to Sofia. When did the detective do that? She had only maybe ten minutes alone between bringing the new evidence into the lab and driving here. She must have spent some time with them on the telephone.

"His poor family. Will they come over?"

"Yes, they will."

"Can I ask you how he died?"

Sofia looked to Sara. "His neck was broken." She didn't want to mention the wings.

Mrs. Wittenheimer put one hand on her heart. "How can somebody do something to a young, lovely man?"

"We will find that out." Sofia stood up and gave Mrs. Wittenheimer her card. "If you can remember anything unusual, please let me know."

"I will. Shall I send the other in, now?"

"Yes, please."

They spend another hour talking to the coworker of Jared Joston, but nobody could tell them anything. The answers they got were the same Mrs. Wittenheimer had given to them. Jared Joston was a friendly young guy, interested in birds and medicine, who didn't shared any more private details at his work place.

"A little bit more than an hour overtime, you're good." Sofia stopped next to Sara's car.

"I know. And I wrote myself off the clock for exactly one hour."

"You gave fifteen minutes to the lab for free?"

"Whatever it takes to keep Ecklie quiet."

"Good reason. I see you tonight."

"What about the coffee?" Sara grinned.

"Coffee?"

"Yeah, I thought we're going to have coffee. Something to eat would be nice too."

"You're just saying yes to prove me wrong because I said you won't come with me for coffee."

"Don't take yourself too highly, Curtis, you don't have such an influence of my life. Take the coffee or leave it."

"Where?"

"Follow me." Sara smirked. Maybe Sofia was right and she did this mainly to prove her wrong but telling her that would bring back this awful smug smile in Sofia's face and Sara would try to avoid that.

They drove to a little diner, not too far away from both homes. Sara ordered a coffee, black, and a vegetarian omelette, Sofia a coffee with crème and a danish.

"You know, bird man and you have got something in common." Sofia said when they had their coffee.

"What?"

"You both only exist in your work and not a private life."

"I've got a private life."

"A private life nobody knows about."

"That's why it's called private life, so that not everybody knows about it. Privacy means not open to the whole world. I know, privacy is nothing our community today appreciate anymore, they love to show off all they have, love to tell everybody what they are doing and thinking right now, with the help of the internet it's possible and they love it. Once upon a time a secret was something only one person knew, today it's a secret if it's not written on Facebook or twitter. Probably people even consider that as secrets, because it's only their best friends who can see the page and what they've done or know – all 187 friends."

"You're an amazing anti – social."

"I'm not anti – social. I keep the old version of privacy, call me old-fashioned if you want."

"Old-fashioned means, there are some people who know at least something about you. Who knows anything private about you?"

"The people who have to."

"Grissom."

"Yes, Grissom happens to know quite a few things about me."

"I could asked you something right now, but you won't answer it, because it will be too private and I wouldn't be surprised if you spill your coffee on me if I ask."

"I wouldn't waste my coffee on you, Sofia."

"Do you sleep with Grissom?"

"As you said, it's not your business."

"No it isn't. Sometimes I ask questions that aren't my business."

"You can ask me whatever you want, whenever you get an answer is another thing."

"That means I won't get an answer on this question."

"Even if I would, it wouldn't change anything, would it? Or would you run to Ecklie and tell him?"

"No." The smirk vanished out of Sofia's face and she turned serious. "You know I'm not Ecklie's pet. Whatever you tell me about yourself, and even if it's only your favorite color, I'd treat as confidential. What we talk after work is nobody's business."

"Now you understand me. Private life is nobody's business, only your own. And if more people would mind their own business, less crime would happen."

"They wouldn't help anymore if somebody is in danger."

"Most people are in danger because other people didn't mind their own business. They kill somebody because of the race, sexuality, religion, sport or whatever you can't have in common."

"Some people like exactly that about other people."

"What?"

"That they're so different."

"Most people are scared or react negatively to people who aren't like them."

"Well, I'd say we're quite different, I don't hate you. If you hate me, you hide it good; most times at least." Sofia leant back and smiled.

"What do you mean? I show sometimes that I hate you?" When did she do something like that? They worked together, Sara tried to be as friendly as possible without crossing a line of being too friendly. After all, they were colleagues, not friends. It wasn't like they could choose to work together, somebody else made the decision for them.

"You don't seem to be happy to work with me."

"Not again." Sara buried her face in her hands. She could feel her headache coming back. Why did she say yes to coffee? Why did she end up in this position? Why couldn't life stop bothering her with things like that?

"Sofia, I don't hate you."

"But?"

"No buts. I might be not that cheerful when we meet at a crime scene like Greg is, I might be not as chatty as Catherine is and I'm not that polite like Nick, but that doesn't mean I hate you. I know you're doing a good job, you're one of the best investigators I've ever worked with, you're a good detective. Why should I hate you? What reason do I have to hate you?"

"Because you thought I'd flirt with Grissom." Point for her. Sara was jealous when Sofia came to their shift, Sara didn't act nice, but then again, she never hated the blonde woman. And at the end Grissom might have enjoyed the attention, but he always turned to Sara. Before Sofia left Vegas and came back.

"I know there was never anything between you and Grissom. I was annoyed, yes, but I never hated you."

"It sometimes feels so."

"I'm sorry for that, I never wanted you to think that. I can promise you here and now, I don't hate you, sometimes I even enjoy working with you."

"Sometimes?" Sofia couldn't stop a smirk. That was probably the nicest thing Sara could say to her, everything else wasn't her style.

"Yes, when you're not that awful arrogant and smug, it's quite nice." Sara grinned.

"As you mentioned a few hours ago, unfortunately I'm too often smug, arrogant, my superego is too big and…what else was it?"

"Stop it. I'm sorry for that."

"Why? I asked you. When I ask you a personal question, I consider before I ask, if I really want to hear the answer and if under any circumstances I think, you might say something I don't want to hear, I don't ask."

"That, Sofia Curtis, is the smartest thing I've ever heard you saying." Sara laughed.

The smug smile appeared again in Sofia's face. And that was the next nicest thing Sara Sidle ever said to her.


	6. Chapter 6

**Wednesday afternoon / Thursday night**

Who dared to turn the music so loud? Sara groaned. It sounded like her neighbor had turned his stereo on to the max and celebrated a party right next to her bed. At least it was a nice song, it sounded like...it was her mobile! Sara opened her eyes, grabbed the still vibrating and playing mobile.

"Yes?"

"Sorry to wake you up, but we've got a db."

"Sofia?" That wasn't the best way to start a new day.

"At least you remember my name. I'll be with you in twenty minutes." The connection was gone before Sara could say anything more. One look on her clock on the wall told her it was 4pm, time to get up anyway. It must have been the first time in ages that she slept more then six hours in a row. It seemed like her body was in desperate need for some sleep. What didn't mean she felt good.

She took a quick shower grabbed some clothes and was standing twenty minutes later with wet hair outside where Sofia waited.

"I'll take my car to the lab."

"No lab, we're going straight to the scene, I've your kit in here, so is your vest. Hop in." The blonde had her sunglasses on and was in no mood for a discussion.

"What do you know about the db?" Sara asked after she sat down on the passenger seat.

"Fits our case. That's we're on it."

Sara looked at the detective. Her mood had been better. It wasn't Sara's business to ask, but what was she supposed to do? No, people talk too much anyway. If they would shut up more often, they'd have fewer arguments.

"Wings again?" It wasn't a question, it just slipped out of Sara's mouth.

"Well, our case is not famous for his broken neck."

Yes, Sofia was definitely in a bad mood. That was now more than obvious. Sara didn't really care why but she cared about the attitude the blonde showed to her.

"You seemed to have had a bad sleep or whatever. But if it's nothing I've done to you, I'd appreciate it if you stop snapping at me. If I did something to bring you in this mood, tell me." She had to work with her, and she had no intention to be on her toes and handle her with extra care for something that wasn't her fault and she didn't know about.

"Sorry, won't happen again." Sofia starred at the street.

Sara closed her eyes. Why are women so complicated? No wonder she preferred to work with guys. When guys were mad at someone, they'd yell, argue, get everything out of them and then it was over. Women had this thing that they had to suffer and let everybody around them suffer as well from their bad mood.

It wasn't like Sara was a happy person right now. She was tired, she had no time for a coffee or something to eat and her plans for the afternoon weren't coming in for work early. Which also meant, she was building up overtime.

They didn't talk until they arrive at the crime scene. Again it was in the desert and not too far away from where they had found the first body. Sara was relieved to see that Greg was already on the scene. Why didn't he pick her up?

"Hey Gregg."

"Sara, you slept well?" His eyes were laughing.

"Don't make it sound like I slept in. We're still way before our shift starts. Why are you already here?"

"I was at the lab when the call came in. I wanted to come over to your place to get you, but Grissom send me straight to the scene. They called Sofia to bring you here."

"She had my kit."

"A black and white brought it to her, saved us some time."

"And me a nice drive." Sara mumbled.

"What?"

"Nothing." She lifted the crime scene tape and walked carefully to the body. This time it was a woman, a young woman. Her wings were all over the place, it didn't look like she was left here as carefully as the last body.

"Struggle?" Sara looked at the feathers all around the body.

"Maybe. The last one looked peaceful, she looks restless, like she fought."

"Did you see any defensive wounds?"

"No visible bruises. If she fought right before her death they might show up later." They both knelt next to the woman.

"I found some fibers on her hand. No tire marks, no boot prints."

"The street is only a few meter away, she is maybe around 100 pounds? Petite."

"Hey." David came to them. "A bird woman." He took a look at the woman. "Looks like she didn't die in peace."

"Nobody dies in piece." Sara answered.

"Some people look like they did, she doesn't." He opened his kit and took the liver temperature. "According to the temperature and the outside condition, I'd say she's dead since the morning, eight, maybe nine o'clock."

"If the killer did her in the morning, then operated the wings on her, he had barely any time between killing, operation and body dumping."

"If he did the same to her than to the man, he needed at least two or three hours for it." David confirmed.

"The call came in at half three, she isn't that long out here. Three hours maybe."

"Let's turn her." David and Greg turned the body.

"So much for our theory." The woman had no wings that were attached to her body, she had only feathers on her back. A lot of feathers, but they were obviously glued to her back. And there was something else different from the first body.

"Is that a bullet entry?" Sara took a closer look.

"Looks like." David bent over. "There was no wound on the other side, the bulled is still in the body, but the wound looks…"

"Not like a typical gun shot wound, yes."

"I'll take her in and let you know. What I can tell you now is, she wasn't an eagle, she's a peacock."

"Yeah." Sara looked at the long, colorful feathers.

"Scene or witness?" Greg asked.

"Scene." Sara wasn't in the mood to talk to anybody. "Who found her?"

"A tourist."

"What is a tourist doing here?"

"Got lost because she can't read a map. I won't make any comment about women and maps."

"Good boy." Sara took her kit and began to collect feathers. The wind wasn't strong today but she would have a big area to cover, since feather flew away easily.

A second body, somebody was serious about human birds. Well, the first body looked like the killer took more time, more passion. Why had the woman have only glued feathers on her back? Not that she could really use them when they're connected with her body, but it was too obvious useless when they were glued on the back. Had the killer insufficient time with her, unlike the time he had with the man?

"No i.d. so far on the victim." Sofia was next to Sara. This time Sofia didn't scare Sara.

"He was sloppy with her."

"Yes I saw that. And there's a bullet."

"What do you make with that?"

"I'm not a csi, I'm the detective."

Sara held in and looked at Sofia. "I thought we were through this. You were a very good csi, you still know how to think as a csi, and I'm asking for your opinion as a detective and a former csi." What the hell was wrong with Sofia today?

"Maybe it was a chase. He chased her, shot her. Playing hunting season."

"Don't you take the things you shot home?" Sara wasn't a fan of hunting, it was nothing more than legal murder. "You don't shoot a peacock and leave it in the middle of nowhere."

"If she didn't want to be a peacock or a bird at all and tried to escape maybe he saw that as his last chance to save his anonymity. That would explain why he dumped her so close to the street, there was no time."

"This case is strange." Sara found another feather.

"You think it's a serial killer?"

"We've got two bodies, both probably killed by the same person, I'd say the chances it's a serial killer is big. A crazy bird lover, medical person, DNA fanatic who loves to experience and who kills. What a lovely mixture. The stuff my dreams are made of." Sofia turned around and left.

Under other circumstances Sara might have called after her what did happen to "protect the csi on the scene" but she was quite happy that the blonde was gone. In this mood she didn't want her to be around her.

"A veggie burger for you." Gil set a box in front of Sara.

"Thanks." She looked at him in surprise.

"I figured, you went straight to the crime scene, no time for lunch and after a few hours in the desert, also without food, you'd be hungry."

"I am."

"Knowing you, you'd starve to death before you stop working."

"You know me too well." Sara smiled.

Gil laid his hand on her shoulder. "Take a break, eat. Warrick is back tomorrow night, he'll help you and Greg with the case."

"There's already pressure?" Sara knew Ecklie and the Sheriff would be on Gil because of this case. All the evidence said they had a serial killer, the press would start to dig and call in a few hours and all the pressure would end up with Gil.

"Not more than usually. I told Ecklie and the Sheriff I've my best people working on the case."

"They believed that?" Neither Ecklie or the Sheriff were fans of Sara, Ecklie would be more than happy to get her out of the lab, at least he acted like that. And the Sheriff? He thought Sara was a lose bullet. Maybe she was, but that was years ago, at the beginning. She had settled and that was mostly because of Gil.

"Do we care what they believe?" He smiled, touched Sara's hair and started to leave the office. No, they didn't care. He believed in her, that was all that counted for her. And he knew she would never let him down.

"Sara?" He stopped in the doorway.

"Yes?"

"If I were to rearrange the team for this case, it would be still your case. Don't let anybody else tell you otherwise." He smiled and walked away.

"Thanks." Sara whispered. Yes, Gil had always believed in her. When she got herself in trouble, he was there to help her out, when she started to doubt herself, he told her why he wanted her in his team, how much he thought of her. When she needed somebody to be there for her he was there. Hell, he even knew she wouldn't eat and got her something to eat. With all that, there was no need to ask why they were still friends, even after their relationship. If she wanted to be anywhere else, she would be a very stupid woman.

She had barely finished her burger when she got a message from Doc Robins, he had some information for her. She could leave the rest for breakfast. Or maybe tomorrow night, if she forgot to bring something to eat again.

Greg was already in the autopsy room.

"Hey, sorry, I had a bite."

"That's alright. Jane and us we're not in a hurry." Doc Robins lifted some x-ray pictures. "I was about to tell Greg about the bullet."

"Nine millimeter?"

"That would be my guess, Greg. Unfortunately I can't give you a better answer. There was no bullet in her body."

"But we couldn't find a exit wound, it must be in there."

"The bullet hole looked strange." Sara remembered.

"And that's because somebody got the bullet out of her. Probably with tweezers. Smart guy."

"Is her neck broken too?"

"No. COD is a gunshot wound. Her neck was alright, no medical experiments on her."

"That was strange, you would think, that our killer starts with glue and then operates next. It looks like he's going backwards." Greg said.

"Maybe she wasn't worth the effort. I found in her stomach cake and chocolate. Not the typical food for birds."

"If we have an experiment here." Sara started. "Somebody saw her eating these stuff and then decided she wasn't worth being in the project anymore. He shot her, glued some feathers onto her back and left her in the desert."

"The first victim was left without any signs of struggle, like a stuffed animal, you prepare it lovely and admire it. The second one was like a victim of a hunt. You shoot it, you don't really want to do anything with it, so you leave it. Only take the evidence."

"Human hunting is illegal, you don't want to be found."

"Even if he sees them as birds, it will still be illegal. And you know, if you leave evidence, somebody will find you, will try to stop your project. He'll think he's doing the right thing but he knows, all the other people won't think the same." Sara trembled for a moment.

"He'll think that when his experiment works out, everybody will see what a great job he's done and how he helped mankind." Greg sighed. There were chances that they were dealing with a crazy killer. Not his favorite kind of killer, they were unpredictable.

"Any traces?"

"I sent the feathers and the glue to traces. Because of the dust we found at the other victim, I took some samples of her skin before I washed her. He had to bring her there, I couldn't find any fibers, it might be again a foil."

"That's Hodges job." Sara looked at Greg.

"Yes I'll deal with him. You take the moody detective." Greg also noticed the bad mood Sofia was in today and was quite happy to be in the lab.

"I have to call her anyway, maybe she has got something on the db."

"Nothing in AFIS so far." Greg has started to run the fingerprints. Wendy took care of the DNA, but that could take some time.


	7. Chapter 7

"You still have a headache?" Sara looked up. Sofia was leaning against the door, watching her. Sara was concentrated deeply in her work, she had no idea how long the blonde was there, watching her. A few seconds, a minute, minutes? Whatever it was, she didn't like it. And yes, she had a headache.

"You're still grumpy." Sara's eyes went back to her case file, her way to say, she wouldn't talk to Sofia if she was in a bad mood.

"I've got a name for our victim." Just like Sara, Sofa ignored the last sentence from the woman. "Iris White, 24, born in Idaho, was a student at the university here."

"Address?"

"One of the dormitory on campus. You think seven is a good time to visit the students?"

"They'll hate you." When she was a student, Sara didn't mind getting up early, but she knew, she was a minority.

"Do you have anything else you need do right now?"

"I'm working, as you can see."

"I mean something urgent."

"Why?" Somehow Sofia could make Sara suspicious with simple question. Why did the detective want to know if she had anything urgent to do? Did she need somebody to relief her bad mood? Sara isn't willing to be that person.

"I want to go to the dormitory in the afternoon, and like you said, you have to try not to get too many overtime in the next weeks. If we both go home now, we won't collect too much overtime."

Sara eyed Sofia, still suspicious. Since when did she care about Sara's overtime?

"For Christ's sake, Sara, stop looking at me like that." Sofia's voice wasn't raised, it only sounded annoyed, frustrated and a little bit angry.

"Why do you care?"

"I'm trying to be nice, forget it. Three o'clock, be here on time." Sofia turned around and walked away before Sara could say anything.

Sara knew, she had to go with the detective later, it was her job. And she knew, Sofia was right, if Sara would stayed until the official end of her shift, she'd collect too much overtime and that what would put her seminar in danger. Everything Sofia did was for Sara's well – being, like any good colleague would do. So why did she reacted so rudely? What made her push Sofia away all the time when there was no reason to act like that.

She sighed and got up. Without thinking her legs carried her to Gil's office.

"Hey." She said.

"Hey." He needed only one look. "You've got a headache."

"How can people see when I've got a headache."

"Who else can see that?"

"Sofia."

"Maybe we know you."

"That's creepy."

He smiled amused.

She sat on the chair in front of his desk. "At least when she can, it's alright with you."

"You two had a fight."

"Stop doing that, stop knowing what happened before I told you."

"Sorry." He still smiled. "Go home, Sara."

"What?"

"You were working since four, go back home, sleep, try to get rid of your headache, you'll have to start early again…I've read Sofia's report, the two of you have to talk to the students. Go home, catch some sleep."

"Maybe I should."

"I know you don't like it."

"If I stay here I'll get too much overtime. Did you tell Ecklie about your idea that I should go?"

"I did."

"And?"

"He's delighted."

"Liar." She had to laugh. Ecklie was probably at lot of things, but he was never delighted. "He hates me and will only let me go because this way he doesn't have to see me for a few days. And because you told him you want me to go."

"If I try to talk him into letting you come with me, he'd wonder why I do that, if there's anything between us, he had to know of."

"And we can honestly say: no, there's nothing, we're only coworker and friends." Sara stood up. "You should go home yourself ASAP, Gil, you need some rest."

"I have some paper work."

"It's always the paper work that tires you. Paper work and politics, it's never the case that makes you tired."

"The happy sides of being a supervisor."

"Remind me that I'll never become one. I think I'm not good with politics."

"Neither am I." He forgot about them sometimes but he could handle the people. Sara couldn't. She'd probably smack them after a day or two.

Sara smiled. "I'll see you tomorrow. I'll make a little detour before going home."

"See you tomorrow."

Sara stopped by in the lab where Greg was. He had no news, so she told him, she'd go home to be back for the interviews in the afternoon. And then she did something, which she didn't really like. She walked over to Sofia's office.

The blonde detective was sitting at her desk, reading a report.

Sara leaned at the door, the same Sofia had done before with Sara and watched her for a couple of seconds.

"You're welcome to come in or you go, stop standing and staring." Sofia didn't bother to look up. For a moment Sara was wondering how she knew that Sara was here, she had made no sound. Then there was an urge to leave after that snappy comment, but she didn't come here to let her scare her away. She could be a bitch too.

Sara closed the door behind her, didn't waste any time to sit down and went on looking at Sofia, who was still reading.

"I told you to stop staring at me. Tell me what you want."

"You're reading, I wanted to wait until you're done. It's rude to interrupt somebody when she's working."

Sofia closed the file and finally looked at Sara.

The investigator could see the bad mood, it was written all over Sofia's face, she could see the blonde was in a mood to fight, but she could see something else. Sofia was…Sara didn't know if the detective was hurt, but something was haunting her.

"I'm sorry." That wasn't so difficult.

"What for?"

Okay, now it started to become difficult.

"I didn't mean to be bitchy to you."

"You are just a bitch."

Okay, maybe Sara deserved that.

"I could come up with excuses that I'm tired and that I've got a headache, but I won't. They don't count. So yes, I am a bitch. And I've no idea why I'm suspicious all the time when you offer me something that's actually nice. I'm sorry for that. You meant good to tell me, we have a three o'clock appointment, I appreciate that you told me. There's nothing urgent on my desk anymore, I'll clock out and be back here at three." Sara paused and looked at Sofia. It wasn't her business to say the next thing. "You should go home too. It's none of my business but you look like you could use some sleep too." She got up ready to leave the office.

"How bad is your headache?" Headache? Was Sofia trying to blame Sara's behave on her headache?

"I had some pills, they don't really work. I'll take something stronger when I'm at home." And mix it with a beer or two.

"You scared of me?"

"No." Sara shook her head and looked skeptical at Sofia. Why should she be scared of her?

"Do you trust me?"

"We work together, your job is to make sure I'm safe while I'm working, nothing ever happened to me when you were on duty. Why should I not trust you?"

"I'm not talking about work, Sara."

Oh, that was something different. Why should she trust Sofia privately? They weren't friends, they didn't spend time together. Where were these questions leading to?

"I've no reason not to trust you."

Sofia took a good at Sara without a word. She closed her file, got up and walked to the investigator.

With every second in silence, Sara became a little bit more nervous. What was on Sofia's mind? Why did she ask all these question and why didn't she say anything now?

"Let's go." The blonde finally broke the silence and took her jacket.

"To where?"

"Your place."

"What?" Did Sara miss something? Like a whole big, very important point. She came here to apologize for being bitchy. How come that Sofia suddenly invited herself to Sara's place? Sara was tired, had a headache, wanted to sleep and Sofia looked like she needed sleep herself. There was no point in going to Sara's apartment. She didn't like people in her apartment.

"You're headache won't go away with more pills."

"So?" First she had to try it then she could say it wasn't working. Something would be strong enough.

"How was your head yesterday after I gave you the massage for a few minutes?"

"Better." She didn't need any tablets for the rest of the night, that was quite nice. Unfortunately the headache was back when she woke up.

"I told you, it will be only for a short time, you're too tensed up. This time I'll try to loosen some of these tensions up. Then you should be better." Sara wanted to say something but Sofia cut her off. "I can't work with you if you're not fit enough to do a proper job. We have a serial killer, I need your head 100 percent fit. You can go to a professional physio but it will take ages until you'll get an appointment. And no, I can't do it here, you're likely to fall asleep while I work on you and you need proper sleep in your bed. Let's go."

Sara stared at her. Sofia was about to give her a massage? She was about to give her a massage in Sara's apartment because Sara would fall asleep?

"You can move now or I'll tell Ecklie you're physically not in any stage to work."

"That's blackmailing." Sara looked angry at Sofia and followed her out of the office.

"I'm fine with that if it's working."

"Why…"

"I told you, I need you fit. I don't want to find more young bird – humans."

Sofia clock out and walked to her car. Sara followed her, unable to get her head straight. She was about to take Sofia to her apartment, she would get a massage and…well, okay, she could see why there were these questions about trust. Yes, she did trust Sofia, she didn't stop her so far and she was sure she wouldn't stop her later. And a massage was very tempting. She hasn't had one in ages.

"I'll follow you. Don't try to escape, I'll give you a ticket for every time you're too fast."

"You're making yourself not very popular."

"That will change as soon as your pain is gone."

Sara couldn't argue with that. She'd hate Sofia for the next minutes, but as soon as the detective made her headache disappear, Sara would like her.

Not because Sofia threatened her with tickets but more because she needed some time to think and for herself, Sara drove exactly how she was supposed to.

"I haven't tidied up." She didn't expect anybody, hell, there were quite a few days she turned off her door bell so that nobody could ring it. Was she anti-social? Maybe some people would say so. She preferred to say, she liked to have a quiet life without anybody bothering her.

"I don't care."

Sara opened her door. It wasn't messy in her apartment, she was a tidy person. The only place where anything could get lost was her desk when she threw everything on it to tidy up on her free days. She had no time for reading while she was working, so she put everything she wanted to read on her desk and read it in her past time.

"What now?" Sara wasn't sure what to do.

"Now you'll take a hot shower, that will do the first step, change in something loose and comfortable and I'll do the rest."

"Okay. Uhm, help yourself with anything from the fridge."

"Thanks." Sofia waited until Sara was in the bathroom. In the apartment of Sara Sidle. What did led her to offer Sara a massage? Especially after the csi was everything but nice to her. Well, she wasn't a sunshine either today, so what would Sara do to make up for all the times, she was – just herself?

She found some beer, juices, fruits and vegetables in the fridge, a lonely slice of bread and some yogurt. With a glass of juice she sat on the couch and closed her eyes and turned on the tv. The night program had been bad the last time when she watched it, that was a year ago, it was still bad. Why did they repeat all these talk shows from the afternoon? Why didn't they show some of the old shows? The classic shows from the 70's or 80's? Hell, even Mr. Ed was more interesting than these people on talk shows.

Why do they go there anyway, Sofia wondered. If you've got a problem, try to solve it, don't sit down in front of a tv camera and tell the whole world. It won't make your problem disappear, it will make you look stupid. And why do people watch these shows? Do they watch it to see there are actually some people who have bigger problems than themselves? Does it give them power to see how other people struggle? How they fail and humiliate themselves? That doesn't sound good for the human race.

"Sofia?" Sara was standing in the doorway. "Are you alright? You can go home."

"I didn't come here to go home after five minutes." Sofia looked at Sara. She was wearing a white loose t-shirt and black boxer shorts. "I was wondering why people go to talk shows and why other people watch them."

"Because there are too many stupid people on this planet."

"I couldn't agree more." Sofia got up.

"And now?"

"Now we go to your bed."

Sara cocked her head. "The last time somebody tried to get me into a bed that way ended up quite painful for that person."

"I'm pretty sure this person didn't have a massage for you on his mind."

"Probably not."

"Always remember, my job is to protect you, you can trust me."

"You're off duty."

"A detective is never off duty. We're always on duty, unfortunately we don't get paid twenty-four-seven." She followed Sara in the bed room. Sara had a French Bed in the middle of her room.

"Soft or hard?"

"I beg your pardon."

"Your mattress. Is it a soft or a hard one?"

"Hard."

"Good. I can't work on a soft one. The floor would be better than a soft one."

"I get a sore back from soft mattresses." Feeling a little bit uncomfortable having the other woman in her bedroom, being almost naked and feeling how Sofia followed her to her bed, Sara laid down. If anybody would have told her a few hours before she'd be in bed with Sofia Curtis this night, Sara had laughed.

"What do I have to do?"

"Close your eyes, relax, I'll do the rest."

"That's what my first boyfriend said…" Why did she tell that to Sofia? Only because it crossed her mind and she had to stop from laughing when she thought about that.

"I'm sure he said it with the best intention." Sara could hear the amusement in Sofia's voice. She had probably the same experience.

"That's what I was thinking at that time."

"I promise, I'll be better."

"He didn't raise the bar very high."

"What a shame, I like challenges." Sofia's hands touched Sara's temple, her neck and her back. "I gonna start on your head, walk my way down to your neck, your shoulders, upper back to the lower back. Any bruises, scratches or anything else that might hurt you when I touch it?"

"No."

"Good." Sofia's fingers started to move softly in little circles above Sara's eyes. As uncomfortable Sara had felt first, as soon as she felt the soft movements on her body, she relaxed with every second a little bit more. The strange idea of having Sofia here became a very pleasant one.


	8. Chapter 8

**Thursday afternoon**

When Sara woke up it was dark. Was it still night? She risked a short look on her clock and almost jumped out of her bed. It was half past one pm! She slept for seven hours and she slept very good. What…Sofia! Yes, Sofia had come to Sara's place to give her a massage for the headache. The blinds were closed that why it was dark in her room, Sara usually never closed her blinds. Sofia must have done that. Sofia. The headache was gone, and so was Sofia. Sara couldn't remember when the detective left. She couldn't remember anything. Only Sofia's hand on her head, neck and…did she ever reached the back? Probably but Sara was by that time long asleep. She moved her head. No pain. She rolled her shoulders. Wonderful, nothing hurt. She felt absolutely fine for the first time in a long time.

Sara opened her bedroom door. No sign of Sofia, she must have left. When? A little note on her bench gave her some answers.

_Good morning!_

_I let myself out. You were out in five minutes, never thought you'd fall asleep that fast. Hope your headache is gone. See you at three in the lab._

_Sofia_

Yes, the headache was gone. God, she couldn't say it often enough. The headache was gone. Hopefully for a long time.

She jumped under the shower and made the decision she'd cook today. This good mood was worth a fight with the oven.

With a smile on her face she arrived a few minutes before three in the lab, changed into her work outfit and went for a coffee. None of her nightshift colleagues were here, they all seemed to enjoy their well earned sleep. With a black coffee in one hand and one with crème in the other she walked to Sofia's office.

The detective was at her desk, finishing a phone call and pulling files with the other hand. A smile appeared on her face when she saw Sara and she waved her with her eyes in the office.

"…yes, I'll do that….no, no, that's alright…yes…yes…I'll send it over to you…yes, tonight…okay…bye." She rolled her eyes and put the phone back on the station.

"Hi, sorry."

"No problem." Sara put the coffee on the table. "With crème."

"Wow, what a service."

"It's the least I can do. I'm sorry for falling asleep last night."

"I didn't expect anything else. A lot of people fall asleep when they get a massage. There's actually a way to make people fall asleep by pressing the right spots."

"You knocked me out?"

"No." Sofia laughed. "No, I never came close to those spots, you were sound asleep in five minutes."

"I'm not the best host."

"As I said, I expected you to sleep. How's your head?"

"No headache."

"Good. It won't be permanent, there're still a lot of tension, but I think, I got most of them last night."

"How long did you…" She didn't want to say work on me, that sounded strange. "…stay?"

"Two hours."

"What? You're kidding me?" Sara looked horrified at Sofia.

"No."

"You're crazy, two hours. You should have left after I was sleeping, you were tired too." Sofia still looked tired, but Sara didn't want to say that.

"I don't like unfinished business. I left when I thought you're fine and free of pain for a longer time."

"Two hours."

"A good massage takes its time."

"The way my back and my head are feeling today, it was a fantastic one. If you ever get sick of the police work, I'd highly recommended you as a physio."

"Thanks, I love my job but it's nice to have alternatives."

"Sometimes you wish for them."

"Usually when the paper and the politics take more time of your day than a criminals."

"At the moment we don't have this problem."

"No, we don't. Shall we go?"

"Who's driving?"

"You. You need your kit."

"Okay." They left the office and went to Sara's car.

"Do we have some real appointments or are we going there on the off chance?"

"The surprise on our side, sounds like a good plan. Did you talk to the parents yesterday?"

"Yes." Sofia sighed. She hated this kind of phone calls. How often had she destroyed peoples life with only one phone call or visit? Too often.

"They're taking a plane to here today, we can talk to them later. I think they'll arrive around seven or eight."

"We?"

"I won't go anywhere without my csi."

Sara raised an eyebrow. Her csi? Sara didn't belong to anybody.

"Kidding. I'll talk to them."

"No, I can be there too." It wasn't procedure as usual, but it was possible. Especially when Sofia was as tired as she looked. Sara owned her big time for the massage last night.

"Only if there's nothing in the lab."

"We'll see." Having Greg and Warrick in the lab, there was enough time for Sara to be out in the field.

They parked on the campus and took a look around. A lot of students were sitting outside, chatting, reading, some even slept in the sun.

"Dormitory five." Sofia read. She felt like being back in college. What a great time she had. All the parties, good conversations, funny afternoons with friends sitting in garden, in a café, in someone's flat, listen to music instead of learning.

Two years of freedom, when she left college and went to the police academy, her lifestyle changed. She was serious about her future job, she was a keen student, hungry to learn all the tips and tricks. There weren't many evenings she spent in bars, most of the time she was learning or out to do some fitness. And self-defending courses.

"Her room number was two-one-seven."

"What did the dean say?"

"He wants to talk to us at four o'clock. When was the last time you got called in the principal's office?"

"What makes you think I ever was?" Sara grinned.

"Right, I forgot, you're the geek, you did nothing than studying. Did you do any sport?"

"Some of the science books were quite heavy, I count that as weight lifting."

"Geek.

"Let me guess, you were the trouble maker. It was clear you'd end up in prison or putting other in it."

"I didn't cause any trouble, I was…I kept my teachers entertained."

"Busy."

"They weren't bored."

"Trouble starter."

"Not starter but…I wasn't far away from the trouble."

"A devil with an angel's face."

"That's what my nanna used to say."

They opened the door to the dormitory and found the stairs right next to them.

A young woman with spikey red hair opened the door after Sofia knocked for the fifth time.

"What?"

"Detective Curtis, Miss Sidle, csi, are you the room mate of Iris White?"

"Yeah."

"We need to ask you some questions."

"Listen, she's boring, she isn't doing anything else than studying. You must have to wrong one."

"Are we looking for you?" Sofia's voice was bitter sweet.

"No!" The was the woman said that made Sofia believe, she should maybe take a look at her.

"Are we allowed to come in?" Sara asked.

Without another word the red haired let them in the room. It was like day and night in a twenty square meter room. The left side, obviously Iris' side, tidy, with a huge book shelve, a well made bed and a desk where everything was on its place. And the other side the wall was full with poster from music bands, events, newspaper articles, the bed looked like she came straight out of it, clothes were all over her side, empty cigarette boxes, empty beer bottles, half full boxes with delivered food. Sofia doubted that it was possible to put two people in a room that were less different than these two were.

"When was the last time you saw Iris?"

"We don't hang out together."

"You share a room." And her side looked like you could tell if anybody was in bed.

"I don't know, I wasn't here on the weekend."

"What's about yesterday and Tuesday night?"

"She wasn't here yesterday…I think…I don't know." The young woman dropped herself on her bed. "I came back around four in the morning, was too tired to look if she was in."

Sara and Sofia looked at each other. Was this woman kidding or was she serious? It was a one room, you opened the door and could see if anybody was in or not.

"I try not to turn on the light when I come back. So I walked in, it was dark, I fell on my bed and slept until you guys showed up. Why?"

"We need to know when Iris was here the last time."

"Ask one of her teachers."

"We'll do that too. But you're her room mate."

"We share a room, we're barely in the room the same time and when we are, we're sleeping."

"Do you have any idea what she is doing? With whom she spends her time?" Sara looked around.

"I don't care."

"Okay Love, this is how it goes." Sofia pinned her eyes on the young woman. "You go on, playing the cool, I'll let my guys bring you down to central. While you're there we have a long and hard look at your things, we test your blood, we gonna find out, what you're doing, with whom you are and if there's anything else than cigarette in this room."

"You have no…" She got up and stared at Sofia.

"I've got everything I need, I investigate a murder case, I'm allowed to do so many things. So, you gonna start being helpful or you prefer a trip to central?"

"Murder?"

"Yes, your room mate is dead."

"What? How?" That was the first time Sofia could see something like interested in the girl's eyes.

"That doesn't matter for you. Again, tell me everything you know about her. And I mean everything, von facts to rumors. Now."

"I don't know, she studies biology, spends most of the days in her courses or in the library and if she's not there, she out, some bird thing."

"Bird thing?" Sofia tried not to sound too interested. Finally they seemed to get something useful out of the woman.

"Yeah, she loves birds. I saw her once on a web page about birds and flying. Looked like some looneys who thought they could be birds and fly one day. I didn't pay that much attention."

"But you paid attention." Only one glimpse doesn't give you all these information, you see somebody is a community, if it's not the front page, you've no idea what it's about.

"She had told me once that she believes, one day she could fly. They would find a way to give human wings, we are meant to fly, that's why this guy in Italy flew to the Gods in heaven or whatever."

"Ikarus flew too high, his wings burned and he died." Corrected Sara. "And it was Greece."

"All the same. She believed, she can be this Ika guy one day."

"Did anybody visit her?"

"Not that I've ever met anybody here for her."

"Did she have a boyfriend?"

"She never said anything about one. As I said we didn't really talk. This crazy bird stuff was the only thing I can remember."

"You better remember more the next time I come here." Sofia gave her a card. "And we'll be back, trust us." She looked at Sara. "Let's move."

Sara stopped for an blink. Sofia could say than a little bit friendlier.

"Did you play bad cop in the room?" She asked as soon as they were in the hall.

"Yes, I did. Sorry for the harsh tone. I'll get us a warrant for the room, in case red head makes some trouble."

"I think you scared her of enough."

"She deserves more I'm sure she a pain in the ass as a room mate."

"A trouble maker."

"It's a difference if you cause trouble to yourself or to others. I bet Iris had to be out the whole time to get some quiet time. Whatever her name is doesn't strike me as somebody who turns the music down."

"You don't know her name?"

"Not yet, we'll get that in our conversation with the dean."

"Are you gonna be a bad cop again?"

"He's a close friend of the Sheriff."

"You'll be as tame as a kitten." Sara grinned.

"I'll scratch his eyes out if he won't do what I want."

"Back to the black panther."

"Yeah." Sofia laughed. "Greg's still scared?"

"If you'd ask him out for breakfast, he'd never come."

"I might try that, only for the fun of it."

"I'd like to see his face."

"If you tell him a few seconds later that I was with you in your bed we'd have a second photo expression."

"He'd never believe that."

"Can't blame him for that." Sofia smirked and knocked on the door to the dean's office. A second later they got called in and could go straight to the dean.

"Detective Curtis, Miss Sidle." The dean was in his mid-fifties, had short, brown hair, green eyes and obviously knew who Sofia and Sara are.

"Dean Miller, we appreciate that you have some time for us." Yes, Sofia was a very nice cop now. From bitch to angel within seconds, Sara was amused.

"Have a seat. It's a serious reason why you're here. I understood it's the second murder already?" The Sheriff must have had a longer chat with his old friend.

Sara and Sofia made themselves comfortable in front of the desk of the dean.

"Yes, we're afraid it's the second."

"I didn't know Iris White, frankly I don't know really any of my students, it's sad but it's true. The ones who stand up from the rest I know, or at least I know they go to university here. Iris White, I've got her file, made a copy for you too. She was a good student, in the top ten of her courses, she had a bright future." He handed Sara the file. Cooperation seemed in this case no problem, maybe politic was sometimes helpful.

"We talked to her room mate."

"I'm afraid I've no idea who that is." Dean Miller opened the file. "Oh." His face showed, he knew who Iris' room mate was.

"You know her?"

"Unfortunately I also remember a few students who are the opposite of good. Rachele Abanski. She's barely in her courses, we had the police here a few times because of her and her marks are less than average."

"Why is she still here?"

"Her father keeps her in, important man from Utah."

"Oh." As soon as you see the good side of politics, you see the bad side too.

"Is she involved?"

"We doubt that."

"Good."

"But we'd like to search Iris's room."

"Isn't that standard procedure in a murder investigation?"

"Yes, but we wanted to let you know first."

"I appreciate that but you have a job to do. Have a look in the room, take a look around here, we'll do everything that helps you to find the murderer of Iris White." That were words Sofia wanted to hear.

"Is there any connection to the university?"

"We're not aware of them if they are there."

"The first victim was not from here?"

"No."

"That gives me the hope it's nothing about the university."

"We have no evidence that it is something with the university. Dean Miller, do you have a special group at the university, that is interested in birds? Like science, genetic, watching?"

"Not that I'm aware of them, maybe a little group of the biology students, if a few of them meet for bird watching. Why?"

"Rachele mentioned Iris was interested in birds. We're looking for people who can tell us more about her."

"Her course plan is in the file, you might find some people in her courses."

"Thank you, dean." Sofia and Sara stood up and left the office.

"From black panther to snail."

"Shut up. Even you're friendly to a friend of the Sheriff, aren't you?"

"All people are the same."

"Sure. Let's go back to Iris' room, looks like we don't need the warrant, the dean is on our side. Finally something that's easy in this case."

"Weren't you the one who liked challenges?"

"Only for my private pleasure."


	9. Chapter 9

They took the computer back to lab and left it with Archie. Iris had some books about DNA, birds and human too. She studied biology, was specialized in genetic research and birds. Like Jared, Iris wasn't really the social type, Sara and Sofia couldn't find anybody who was really a friend of hers.

"How's the case?" Gil came to Sara who was comparing fingerprints.

"No break through yet. I've got the fingerprints from Jared Joston's flat and the ones I've found in Iris White's room. I doubt we'll find a matching pair, according to Iris' interesting room mate, Iris didn't have visitors."

"Only because people don't know about a relationship it doesn't mean there is none." He smirked and she had to smile True. Nobody would think they were together for two years, there was no evidence of their relationship. At least no visible.

"You're right."

"You look better tonight."

"I feel better, no headache."

"That's good. What did you take?"

"If I answer that straight it will sound strange."

"Try me."

"I took Sofia home." Sara smirked when Gil looked at her in a mixture of surprise and disbelieve.

"Okay, the full story please. I don't believe the short version."

"Sofia's brother is a physio, she learnt a lot from him. When we were at Jared Joston's house I hit my head on a cage, added to the headache I already had, it got worse. She took five minutes and fixed my head so far that I didn't need any pills for the rest of the night. But my headaches comes from a lot of tensions; apparently. She said she can't fix that in five minutes. Yesterday, when my headache was back, she offered me to give me a massage. We went to my place – don't ask me why, I must have been very sick of my headache – and she started to massage me. I fell asleep after five minutes, she stayed two hours, my head is fine, my back and my neck feel like new and I'm in a perfect work condition." That sounded even for Sara absolutely unreal.

"You must have been in very heavy pain."

"I was."

"Well, it looks like it was worth to trust her, you're fine now."

"Do you want to suggest anything?"

"No." Gil smiled. "Only you should spend more time with people who are good for you."

"Why would you say that?"

"Because if you don't do that, you'll end up like me. With bugs."

"For two years there was more in your life."

"I lost it."

"You didn't really lost it and if you want to use the word lost, than you have to say we lost it." Sara looked serious at him. It was not his fault, it was not her fault, it was their fault.

"Enjoy your life, believe me, you can forget how to enjoy life."

"I'll try not to."

"What's about Greg?"

"Greg? What is with him?"

"Is he still in love with you?"

"Gil, please don't try to set me up with somebody."

"Just asking."

"Remember you're my supervisor, help me with the case."

"You talked to the parents?"

"Yes. They have no idea with whom their daughter spent her time."

"No surprise, kids go away so that parents don't know what they are doing with whom. Anything useful in the room?"

"We hope the computer can help us, Archie has it. So far he didn't text me."

"In that case, enjoy your fingerprints."

"Thanks."

"Oh and Warrick is with Greg, they're working on the construction sides and the medical knowledge. And there are a dozen web pages about human and bird connection in Nevada. They'll check them too."

"Iris White should be a member of these pages."

"Did you find a computer in Jared Joston's house?"

"No." Sara wrinkled her forehead.

"You might think a person with his interests has a computer."

"Shall I go back to his apartment and check it again?"

"Yes. I'd say if it isn't there, somebody was in the apartment and took it or he took it with him when he left the apartment the last time."

"There was no laptop in his car, I'll call Sofia and we'll check it."

It looked like this times it was Sara who was first on the scene. Sofia's car was nowhere to see. The csi took her kit and walked to the flat. She didn't have a key that could be the reason why Sofia was late, she needed the locksmith again.

Hopefully nobody became the victim of their killer this night. Being in a rather quiet area Sara was able to see some stars. A good night to be in the desert and watch stars, shooting stars and the moon. Why did she never take time to go to the desert when she was off duty? It was not like she'd change her sleeping pattern when she off duty. She had spent some nights out with Gil, watching stars and meteoric.

"Hola chica." Sara turned around. She didn't hear anybody coming close to her. Suddenly out of the nowhere were two young men standing only yards away from her. Both looked like they belong to a gang. Not the kind of company she wanted.

"Chica with a vest." The taller one let his eyes run up and down her body.

"Chica bonita." The smaller one said.

"I'm with the crime lab. Please just go on, this is an ongoing investigation."

"Sí, sí we can investigate something too, chica."

Sara took her gun, trying hard to stay calm.

"Please, I don't want to use this one."

"Who said we don't have the same toy and a amigo of us is behind you, pointing his toy on your back?" Sara fought the force to turn. Turning was a mistake, don't make mistakes.

"Hey, back off my csi or I'll be your diablo with a gun."

Sara couldn't remember when she was ever that happy to hear Sofia's voice.

The two guys turned. Out of the dark, Sofia appeared, the gun on the chest of the taller one. She was dressed in black, that's why nobody saw her.

"Pronto."

"Sweet chica, we're only playing." The taller grinned.

"Nobody plays with my csi. Turn around and down on your knees."

"What?"

"You got me. Don't try to run I had a very bad day, I'm in a very bad mood, you're delaying my after work, my finger is very nervous. Down. NOW!" She undid the safety of her gun. The two men did how she told them.

Sofia took her cuffs and cuffed them together. A few blocks away she could her a black and white coming with the siren.

"My friends are coming, they'll find some nice boyfriends for you. If you're lucky you'll get out in the morning, if you're unlucky you'll meet me again."

"We…"

"Shut up!" She waited until two officers arrived. "Bring them down. Attempted rape, attempted assault."

"We never…"

"You have the right to remain silent! Guys, tell them the rest even I'm quite sure, they have heard all that before."

"Oh, one thing." She walked to the police car before they could get inside. "I want my cuffs back, they're special." She took the handcuffs from one of the officer and cuffed each of the guys right.

"Now I feel better. Thanks guys for being that fast."

"No problem, detective."

Sofia smirked and turned away from the car. As soon as the black and white was away and she reached Sara her smirk vanished and was replaced with sorrow.

"You're alright?"

"Yeah, nothing happened."

"I'm sorry I'm late, I had to get the key first."

"It's alright, I had a gun. I wasn't helpless."

"Getting somebody off you with a gun is not your job. A csi is not supposed to use his or her gun. Not if the detective on scene does her job right."

"She did her job right, I didn't use my gun, I'm fine, the guys are in their way to central and scared for the rest of their life. You got them with your little speech about your bad day. I believed you too."

"Nobody threatens my csi."

"I'm your csi?" Sara smiled. She didn't know she was Sofia's property but she had to admit, when Sofia called out to leave her csi alone, Sara was very happy, that she was Sofia's csi.

"Well, if you like it or not, as long as we work together on one case, you're my csi. There's nothing you can do to change that."

"Getting a two hour massage, being rescued, why should I want to change that?"

"Good."

"Why are you walking, anyway?"

"Oh, I stopped at the seven-eleven and got some chocolate. After that I thought I can walk that one block."

"Feeling guilty because of the chocolate?"

"Chocolate should never make you feel guilty. It is good for you."

"I think not everybody will say the same."

"Do I care what everybody says?" Sofia grinned and unlocked the door. "All yours."

"What? What happened to securing the scene?" Sara joked.

"I'll be right behind you."

"To watch my back or to have a shelter in case somebody shots from the front?"

"Both." Sofia laughed.

They turned on the lights.

"Where do you want to look?" Sara asked.

"Me? I'm the detective, all I have to do is standing here, watching you and making sure, nobody enters the scene. I don't look for evidence, I might destroy it."

"Stop bitching around. I take the bedroom and the bathroom, when you take the living room, we can share the kitchen are out here ASAP."

"You must be desperate for that seminar that you do all these things to avoid overtime. What did Grissom promise you would happen there in…Idaho? Ohio?"

"He didn't promise me anything."

"Who else is going?"

"Only the two of us."

"How romantic."

"Could be if it wasn't work related, if he wouldn't talk about blood and if there would be any kind of romance between us."

"If I would listen to some rumors…"

"Then you wouldn't be a smart and good detective." Sara walked into the bedroom. Who was telling she and Gil were romantically involved? How did they get these ideas? Was it because everybody was wondering about Gil's private life? She could remember the rumors about him and Terri Miller. They had talked about that, he was fascinated by her work that was all. Gil was a scientist, a lot of people fascinated him. When one of these people happened to be a woman, some colleagues let their imagination run free. Sara knew, beside her, there had been only one woman who had ever really fascinated Gil as a woman.

She lifted the mattress. Nothing. There was no laptop and no computer in this room. The same for the bathroom. Maybe they had to check the shed as well. Jones had kept his birds there, why not keeping the laptop with information about birds close to them?

"Got lucky?" Sofia came in the bedroom.

"You mean, if I got something?" Sara grinned. "No. You?"

"No." Sofia smirked. She didn't pay attention to her sentence before until she saw Sara's reaction. At least the csi was joking about it.

"Okay, the kitchen and maybe a closer look in the shed again. The birds are gone, we can have a closer look now."

"All the evidence is destroyed thanks to Animal Rescue."

"If we didn't find it before, it is our fault."

"True." They searched in the kitchen and went to the shed. The door was open.

"Wait." Sofia took her gun.

"Are you sure that's necessary?"

"Remember these two guys, the door was open, everybody could go inside. My csi stays safe." Sofia opened the door, turned on the light and checked the room.

Sara cocked her head. My csi stays safe. Sofia was serious about this issue. That could be annoying on one side, on the other side it showed Sofia cared about her job and the people she worked with. A thing, Sara appreciated.

"Clear."

"You're playing detective or csi?"

"I don't have to play detective, I am a detective."

"Then let's play csi."

"If that becomes a habit that I've to investigate on scenes, I might asked not to work with you anymore. Nobody else makes me do this."

"Did you spend two hours on anybody else's back?"

"The last time I did that…never mind, no I never spent two hours on the back of one of the other guys."

"See. Your csi is saver when she can leave the dark scene ASAP and she's faster with your skilled help."

"Since your headache is away you're in a funny mood."

"I'm not in a funny mood."

"Not for ordinary people but for you, you are."

"Go and detect something useful, detective." Sara took her flashlight and started to look in the corner. The problem with the modern technique was, it was getting smaller. Ten years ago a laptop was easy to find, now they got so small, they could be everywhere. Who said Joston didn't place it in a box? On a cabinet. Or under a blanket nobody paid attention to? With a size of under a foot, a laptop fit in, on and under everything.

"Let's call it a night." Sofia tried to get some dirt off her trousers.

"Yeah, that was a waste of time."

"We know now, there's in laptop what makes me wonder who wants to have his laptop and why."

"If he had a laptop, maybe it was from any interest to his killer. Likely he had a lot of bird stuff on it, maybe or killer was after some of these information."

"Let's hope Archie finds something on Iris White's laptop." Sofia closed the door behind them.

"Coffee?" She offered ready to take a no.

"Complete breakfast?" Sara countered.

Wow, that was an improvement. No suspicious questions, no strange looks, a yes with an upgrade. "Okay, even better. Where?"

"Your place."

"What?"

Sara smirked. "You saw mine yesterday, now it's your turn."

"It had no time to…"

"Doesn't matter, neither had I. Jump in the car I'll bring you to your car and follow you. If you try to escape I'll take pictures of you speeding and get your license. Then you can be a walking detective, a mall cop."

"Payback is a bitch."

"You can call me Payback if you want." Sara opened her car.

"I don't have anything at home for a breakfast."

"I'll get us something. Don't try to get out of this, you're in too deep."

"Looks like." Sofia laughed. Okay, she would have breakfast with Sara at her place.

Sara let Sofia out at her car and followed her then. Before they arrived at Sofia's place Sara stopped in front of a twenty-four-seven café and got some breakfast and fresh coffee for them. She owned Sofia something for the last night, breakfast was the first step to make it up to her. The second one would come later, depended on how the breakfast would go.

"Your apartment isn't black, wow." Sara looked around. Sofia's place was open and full of light. White was the dominant color.

"Disappointed?"

"No, relieved. I thought maybe the good cop is a play and not the bad one. A bad cop would never live in a white apartment, not the color of the bad people." Sara turned around.

"What's about red?"

"Nice color."

"Angry, aggression, blood." Sofia grinned.

"Love, warmth, passion." Sara answered.

"Not my color."

"I wouldn't say that but black suits you definitely best."

"Thanks. Stool or couch?"

"Couch if that's alright."

"Would be my decision too."

Sofia got some cheese, fruits and yogurt out of her fridge. In Sara's bag were rolls, danish, muffins and scones. And a special surprise, wrapped in an extra paper.

"Your special breakfast treat."

"What is it?"

"You've to look yourself." Sara took a sip of her coffee. Dark black and strong, exactly how she liked her coffee.

"Chocolate croissant?"

"The best way to match your sweet tooth with breakfast."

"Thanks, that's sweet."

"I hope so, it's chocolate." Sara twinkled.

"Did I make your headache disappear and your social side appear?"

"Let's say this is a way of making up for a two hour massage I can't remember."

"Maybe I lied to you."

"Even if you did, my pain is gone, that's all what count."

"I'm happy to hear that." Sofia had some coffee, with a lot of cream.

"And now tell me why you don't sleep."

"I beg your pardon?" She almost spilled her coffee.

"Why don't you sleep? The last two or three nights you looked like you didn't sleep at all on daytime. You never had that before. I'd say the case is haunting you but you looked slightly tired the first night we caught it. So it can't be the case. I mean, you don't have to tell me, I'm just wondering if I can…well, make your sleep appear? Shall I read my exam I wrote for my diploma to you? Worked with a few people." Sara smiled. She had no other idea what to say without putting too much pressure on Sofia. She hoped the little joke kept the blonde relaxed.

"Do I need a prescription for that?" Sofia smiled thinly.

"No, it's free from everything."

"Free stuff works in most cases not."

"You don't have to tell me." Sara didn't want to force Sofia to do anything she wasn't willing to do. If it would be her, she wouldn't be happy if anybody asked her what's on her mind that causes her trouble. She preferred to sort out her problems alone. Or she used to, Gil had change that a little bit.

"I'm afraid it's nothing you can change."

"Okay." No pressure.

Sofia paused for a little while and they both enjoyed their coffee and the breakfast silently.

"I've got nightmares." Sofia closed her eyes. "The last days I tried to sleep I woke up every hour, was restless, tensed, had nightmares. I don't know why, I don't know how to stop them. I was thinking about not to sleep at all."

Sara knew about nightmares, she suffered from them herself. Not so often anymore, but she did for years. All these times when she woke up, seeing the awful pictures of her childhood, the death of her father, foster families that were mean to her. She still woke up every now and then, crying, sweating, not knowing where she was.

"Do they have…are they all about the same thing?"

"No, they're random."

"And you've no idea what caused them?"

"No." Sofia took another sip of coffee.

Sara saw some bottles of coke and energy drinks under the table. "Are you trying to stay awake with that stuff?"

"And coffee."

"You can't be without sleeping. It will drive you crazy, you can't work without sleep."

"I'm better tired than with nightmares."

"You got show me where these spots are and I send you to sleep."

"I don't want to sleep." Sofia's eyes were serious and tired. Sara could see all the hours of missed sleep in the icy blue.

"Okay." She took her empty cup and threw it bag in the bag.

"Okay what?"

"We'll stay awake." She took a pillow and a blanket.

"There's no point in you not sleeping. You can sleep, we need one awake mind for the case."

"I need your mind awake for the case. Your csi isn't safe when her detective is tired."

"Don't go there." Sofia closed her eyes. She didn't want to hear anything like that. Sara would be fine; she had been great all the years without her. Just because Sofia scared two guys away today it didn't mean, Sara couldn't help herself. She had her gun, she had the control of the situation.

"I always go there where I'm not supposed to be, you complained about that two days ago. As long as you follow me, it's safe to go there." She got another blanket and a few pillows. "Lay down."

"What?"

"You heard me. Lay down." Sara got up, pushed Sofia's legs over the edge of the couch and pushed her body down. "Don't you dare to move." She tucked the blonde in a second blanket and sat next to her head.

"What are you doing?"

"Well, you can stay awake if you want, but you're not allowed to move."

"You need to sleep."

"I will." Sara put a pillow on the table and laid her feet on it.

"All the tensions I…"

"As soon as you are sleeping, peacefully sleeping, I'll leave. It's up to you if I stay awake and you had to give me another massage because my back will be back to his old bad shape or if I can go to bed."

"Blackmailing."

"Welcome to my world. Shut up, close your eyes and relax. No nightmare will come to you as long as I'm here. They won't dare to mess around with me." She hoped her nightmares heard that as well.

"You're crazy."

"That's why we're together on this case, they wanted to get the nutcases out of their way. Good night."


	10. Chapter 10

Friday afternoon

Since when was her bed so uncomfortable? Sofia knew she slept not too good the last nights but at least her bed felt comfortable. Why had it changed? It was like…why was she sleeping on her couch? With the one half opened eye she could see her TV. Had she been sitting in front of the TV and fell asleep with one of this boring morning shows? No wonder that her back felt like she got run over by a train. And her neck. What was wrong with the pillow, it was everything but not soft and…ohmygod! Her pillow had legs and wore a jeans! Now both eyes were wide open and she looked directly into Sara's face. What was Sara doing here? And why was Sofia's head in her lap?

She needed all her willpower to literally not jump up and fall down the couch. She got up slowly, trying not to wake Sara up.

"Hey." That didn't work out.

"Morning." Sofia managed to get a smile on her face.

"Confused?" Sara smiled.

"A little bit, yes."

"Looks like I didn't manage to stay awake long enough to leave you. When I woke up it was already twelve."

"You didn't leave."

"No, I didn't want to wake you up. You needed your sleep, look much better now. Black is not your color for under your eyes."

Sofia chuckled. "You're not a pillow that's made for my neck but you made me sleep without nightmares."

"Sounds like we're even."

"Sounds like I've to cuff you to my couch for a good nights sleep, Miss Sidle."

"Well, if you want somebody in chains next to you in bed, I can give you an address where you can find somebody who'll help you with your desire, Detective." Sara smirked.

"You're talking from personal experience?"

"No, I don't."

"Shame, I'd like to hear information first hand."

"Sorry, I can't help you with that." Sara stood up. "See you later at work." It was time for her to go home.

"Hey Sara?"

"Yeah?"

"Thanks. Thanks for staying with me."

"You're welcome."

Sara hadn't planed to stay that long, she fell asleep, probably before Sofia was sleeping.

Sofia sat down in her shower while the water was falling down on her. She felt like a human again, seven hours of proper sleep were like a wonder. The only thing that made her head spin was Sara. She had been there. She stayed. Why? It was a surprise for Sofia when Sara made the decision they'd have breakfast together. A bigger surprise when the investigator said, the breakfast would be at Sofia's place. And when Sofia woke up and looked directly at Sara it was…unreal.

What had the brunette driven to stay? When she said, she'd leave as soon as Sofia was asleep, Sofia believed that. But she was there when Sofia woke up. Why? Maybe she fell asleep before Sofia was sleeping, but she woke up before Sofia, why didn't she leave then? Twelve o'clock, Sofia had enough sleep at that time. Why was it important to Sara that Sofia sleep?

Her beeper made her stop the water. Sighing she wrapped herself in a towel and took the beeper from the basin.

_419. Call for details NOW_

Another afternoon that had to end too soon.

Half an hour later she was again on her way in the desert. If this was the third killing, the killer stuck to his preferred dumping area. Same road, this time on the other side of it, half a mile in the desert.

Brass was waiting for her.

"Sorry to get you in early."

"Hey they called you in early too. Same killer?"

"Looks like." They took a look at the crime scene.

"CSI is already here?" Sofia could see Greg, Warrick and Sara working the scene.

"Yeah, they were fast today. The Sheriff is getting nervous, so does the major. Three bodies in one week, we'll get some hard pressure. The press is waiting, there's a conference later in the afternoon. I want you there."

"Why me?"

"It's your case."

"What am I supposed to tell them?"

"Three suspicious deaths, no connection between the victims, all found in the same area."

"I won't mention the feathers?"

"Would you like to do that?"

"No."

"Good." Brass smiled.

"I'll have a closer look." She lifted the crime scene tape and walked carefully to the place, where David was with Greg, Warrick and the body.

Their victim was male, Sofia guessed in his late twenties, early thirties, white. Feathers were on his back.

"Hi guys."

"Hey Sofia, another bird." David looked up.

"He's similar to the first victim." Greg explained to her. "No bullet, broken neck, feather are in the back of the guy. No i.d. on him."

"According to his body temperature I guess he's dead since the morning. The killer likes to kill in the morning."

"You go out for a hunt in the early morning or late evening." Warrick said.

"With the first shafts of the sun the birds wake up, this one won't wake up anymore." Sofia bent down and took a closer look at the left hand of the victim. "He was married, engaged or had any other kind of ring around his ring finger for a longer time." She pointed to the small skin area at the ring finger of the victim, that was slightly whiter than the rest of the hand.

"Yeah, you're right." Warrick bent over too. "Good eyes, detective, must be the csi in you.." He smiled.

"I'm here to detect."

"What you did. He stopped wearing his ring a little while ago or he didn't wear it for a long time."

"Maybe it was fashion." Greg suggested.

"And how many guys with rings on their ring finger do you know, Greggo?" Warrick teased the younger csi.

"Me? Privately? None…"

"Stop flushing, Greg or is it a sunburn?" Sofia lifted her sunglasses to have a better look at Greg's face what let him turn even in darker red. He didn't like the blue eyes of the detective running over him.

"I just mean, some guys wear rings for fashion reasons…like ear rings or pendants."

"We got you." Warrick grinned.

"What's Sara doing?" Sofia had a look for Sara, who was a few dozen yards away.

"Looking for some traces." Greg took a few photos of the ring finger, happy he wasn't the main topic anymore.

Sofia got up and walked to Sara.

"Hey."

"Could you have a look at this?" Sara didn't bother to look up. She was busy holding a ruler next to something in the sand, Sofia couldn't see. She got down and crouched closer to Sara.

"What is it?"

"I think it might be a rest of a print of a tire. This area is in the direction of the street, maybe our killer didn't want to carry his victim today and drove here."

"It's barely there, if it is a print."

"I know." Sara took a few photos.

"The victim might be married or engaged, his left ring finger looked a little bit like that."

"Would be a shame, but might give us a few more information. And it is a thing he doesn't have in common with the other two. Otherwise he is more like victim number one. The feathers are from a swan."

"A swan?" As far as Sofia could remember, they were black. She had thought, it was an eagle again.

"Black one." Sara finally looked at Sofia when she finished with the photos. "You look much better today."

"Thanks. How's your back?"

"A hot shower made it stop complaining, but I can't do this every night."

"No, and you won't. I'm afraid I've got bad news for your seminar."

"What?" Sara's mood went down.

"The Sheriff and the mayor are not that happy with this case, I guess we'll get some overtime."

"Yeah, I thought so when Grissom told me, I've to go to a press conference later. Waste of time."

"You too? Welcome in the club. Brass told me the same. Who else?"

"Your press guy and Ecklie. What are we gonna tell them?"

"Whom?" Sofia grinned unhappy.

"Well, all of them." Sara didn't want to talk to neither of them.

"Nothing about the feathers, too much risk that a copycat could use that. We've got no connections between the victims so far beside that they liked birds. Two singles, one maybe single."

"We need a name."

"I'll go back to the office, try to find something in missing persons or with the fingerprints. If he was in a relationship, we might have a file."

"I'll finish here and see you later. What time is the press conference?" She didn't bother to remember when Grissom told her.

"All Brass told me was this afternoon."

"I try to be back with you an hour before. We can work on a few things before we meet Ecklie and your guy. Give me a call when you find out something?"

"As soon as I know more I'll call you." Sofia got up, turned, walked a few steps and stopped. "Oh Sara?"

"Yes?" Sara looked up.

Sofia grinned. "Don't walk too far away, I'm not here to have an eye on you and the officers might be not as observed as I am. Can't rescue you when I'm in the office."

"I try to survive, it worked so far all the times when I didn't work with you. Somehow I must know what I'm doing." Sara smirked.

"You do – most of the times."

"See, if I go a little bit further away, there's a good reason."

"I'll tell the officer to take care of my csi."

"Maybe you shouldn't call me your csi when you're talking to him."

"Why? Ashamed?" Sofia cocked her head.

"Get lost, now!" Sara's attention went back to the sand. Maybe she could find a better print a few meter away.

Sofia chuckled and walked back to her car. No, she wouldn't mention that one of the officers should take special care of 'her csi', she knew, that comment would bring them both too much in trouble. Nobody would get that joke.

"That was a complete waste of time." Sara closed the door to her locker too hard. She had finished the press conference and was more than annoyed with it. It weren't only the questions of the reporter, it was the way Ecklie and the Sheriff had acted. She really wanted to punch both hard.

"Leave your locker alone, it's not it's fault." Grissom watched Sara slightly amused.

"That's not funny. Why did I have to go? Isn't that your job?"

"Your case."

"Screw that!"

"Well, language please."

"Screw that too."

He smirked. "I can see you're angry and annoyed, it's understandable. Come on."

"Too where?"

"My office."

"Why? Is that something like being called to the principle?"

"I bet that never happened to you." He just walked away, didn't leave her any other chance than following him.

"Now, that's a good girl." He sat behind his desk.

"If you offer me some candy for sitting on your lap I'll sue you for sexual harassment, Gil." Sara's mood was a little bit better.

"That would never cross my mind."

"Me sitting on your lap or offering me candy for that?" Now it was Sara who grinned.

"Both."

"Liar."

"We're on the clock, honey, try to focus on the case. Ecklie wants a report from you every time before you go home until this case is closed. He wants to know where you go and why."

"Great, another waste of time."

"I know. The construction places Greg found are on this." He handed her a form. "First page all construction places around hospitals and doctors. Second page all doctors we found with a record, page three all doctors living not too far away from a construction place, the rest all the other names and addresses he found."

"It's a little book." She must hold around two dozen pages in her hand.

"Yes. I've got a list of clubs in Vegas that have got anything to do with birds and DNA. Warrick is trying to get the names of the members, runs them to all the names we have so far."

"See you guys did something useful while I had to talk to these id…"

"Archie finished the laptop of Iris White." Gil stopped Sara from swearing. "She was registered to two communities about birds in Las Vegas, four national wide ones and one about DNA. Her laptop was filled with information about DNA, the possibility to mix it and what happened when other species got mixed together."

"Like what?"

"A whale and a dolphin."

"They've got something in common, a human and a bird don't."

"Some people think you can mix everything with everything."

"They should remember their time in high school when they did that with alcohol. Some kinds you can mix, some you can't, it doesn't work out."

"I'll post this as a comment on one of the pages."

"Do that." Sara's mobile beeped. She had a text

"Sofia has a name."

"Good. How is she?"

"Good. I think. Why?"

"She seemed to be a little bit distracted the last couple of days. Today she looked good again."

"Well, I'll tell her you think, she's looking good and she'll be happy."

"I don't think so." Grissom laughed. "But it's good to see the two of you working better together."

"Better together?"

"Sara, it was obvious, there were some…tensions…between the two of you. I'm happy you got over that. Maybe her massage did not only kill your tensions."

"Yeah." Sara stopped and thought. "When I went to Joston's house yesterday night, two guys tried to make some trouble, wanted to scare me. She appeared and kicked their asses. The bad cop really suits her. We had some breakfast later and I think I could help her a little bit with a problem. Positive payback for the massage."

"Payback is not always a bitch. She was a good csi, is a good cop, you're both actually not that different."

"What do you mean?" Now that was a point Sara wanted an explanation for. What did Grissom mean with, they weren't that different.

"Figure it out yourself and stop letting her wait."

"If my supervisor hadn't order me in his office, I'd be with her already."

"Your supervisor just send you away."

"Good." Sara twinkled and left.

Sofia was already in the break room.

"Sorry, I was with Grissom."

Sofia smirked only and Sara rolled her eyes.

"Not that way."

"Didn't say anything."

"What's his name?"

"Brandon Perry, thirty-two, lives down south. Divorced."

"There you've got your ring."

"Ex ring, yes. I called the ex wife, she's still listed as next in kin. She's waiting for us in an interview room, brought the key to his flat."

"Wow, all that in only a few hours. Did she reported him missing?"

"Yes, two days ago. He was supposed to collect Barry and didn't show up."

"They've got a son?" Sara sighed. An ex wife was bad, a son was even worse.

"Kind of. Barry has four legs and loves to sniff around the park."

"Thanks god it's not a child."

"Dogs can be like children and when they lose somebody, they suffer like we do."

"I know but I'm still more comfortable when a dog lost his daddy rather than a child."

"So am I." Sofia stopped at the door, blocking it so that Sara couldn't leave. "Sara?"

"Yes?"

"Thanks."

"What for?" She couldn't remember what special thing she'd done.

"For last night, the whole morning and noon."

"I didn't do anything."

"You stayed. Honestly I've no idea why you did that, if somebody had told me that on Monday, I'd have laughed about this fantasy-fiction story but I got told better. I mean, like four days ago, I was quite sure you…well maybe not hated me, but you were not a fan of me and now…you stayed the whole time."

"You spent two hours working on my back, all I did was sitting and sleeping."

"You watched my sleep. How is your back by the way?"

"Still not that happy with the last sleep, but I'll get it happy later with a long, hot bath. I promised, I'd sleep in my bed tomorrow morning."

"Want a massage?"

"You should catch up with all the sleep you missed out. We've got a lot pressure on our case, I need my detective fit."

"Your detective?" Sofia raised an eyebrow.

"If you call me your csi, you're my detective."

"Okay, I can live with that."

"You have no other choice." Sara pushed Sofia gently out of her way and opened the door. "Let's go and find the case breaker."

"Stop spending time with Hodges."

"Believe me, if there'd be a way to do that, I'd do that." Sara laughed. Unfortunately her cases brought her back to Hodges all the time and when he shut up and worked in silent, he was a great scientist.

"Mrs. Perry." Sofia opened the door to the interview room, let Sara walk inside and closed the door. "I'm detective Curtis, that's Sara Sidle from the crime lap. We appreciate that you took the time to come here."

"You found Jason."

"Yes."

"Can I see him?" Not an usual question for an ex wife. Mrs. Perry seemed to be very sad. Her gray eyes were filled with sadness, her black hair was pulled back in a ponytail and there were traces of tears in her face. Most times Sofia talked to ex wives, they weren't that sad about the lost of their ex husband.

"I'm sorry, he's with the coroner at the moment."

"Who did that to him?"

"We don't know that yet. We hope, you can help us to find his killer."

"How?"

"We need to know as much as possible about your ex husband."

"I try to answer all your questions, officer."

Sofia didn't correct the woman. "Mrs. Perry, you are divorced but it seems like you your ex was still important to you."

"I still love him."

"Then why are you not his wife anymore?"

"I made a terrible mistake one night. Brandon and me, we could forgive each other everything, being late, forgetting the anniversary, different opinions, but there was one thing we both couldn't forgive. It was clear when we started dating, if one of us would be untruthful no matter under which circumstances, the other one would leave. I did this mistake, we got divorced."

"If you loved each other, weren't there any way to avoid that?"

"No, that was the only rule we had. We were still friends, none of us saw somebody else, but I destroyed the faith."

"When did your ex husband leave the house?"

"I left. Over a year ago."

"Do you know with whom he spent his time?"

"We never had the same friends, that was never problem. He had his time with his friends, I had mine with mine, that made the time we spent together, very special."

"What were his hobbies? Any sport?"

"No, he wasn't into sport, that is my hobby. He loved animals, especially birds. That's the reason why I left the house."

"Because he liked birds?" Sofia couldn't help herself than looking in disbelieve.

"No, because he had all the cages around our house. It would have been to complicated to relocate them and it was me, who made the mistake. There was no reason why he should left."

"What kind of birds did he have?"

"All the ordinary domestic birds, some special one, like tropical birds. He bought them legal in a shop, if you want to know that."

"No, that's not important. But do you know in which shops he bought them?"

"I can't remember a name, but I'm sure, if you have a look at his things, there'll be information about that. He once found a bird with a broken wing in the garden, brought it to the vet and took care of it until it could fly again. This bird came back every day to the garden. It was amazing, even when you're not interested in birds, like me."

"Where did he work?"

"He's a nurse in the Palm Dessert."

"A nurse?" The first victim that had a connection to medicine.

"Yes."

"Which department?"

"ER."

"Was he interested in DNA?" Sara asked.

"Funny that you ask, yes he was. Not what you expect from somebody working in the ER. He's got so many books about Mendel."

"Mendel?" Sofia had no idea who that was.

"A very important guy in the genetic area." Sara answered for Mrs. Perry. "He was like the pioneer of DNA."

"Yes. I have no idea about this stuff, but Brandon, he loved it. I gave him a few books about DNA for his birthdays or Christmas. We always gave each other something about the other ones hobby. This way, we had to keep on track with the hobby of the other. Even if I've no idea what these books say, I knew which one he had and he always knew what piece of my sport equipment needed to be replaced." Tears appeared again on Mrs. Perry's face.

Sofia handed her a tissue. She wished, she could let the woman suffer in peace, but there were so many other things, she had to ask her.


	11. Chapter 11

"That was helpful." Sofia got herself a coffee with a lot of crème and sugar while Sara took a sip from her black one.

"And sad. She still loves him."

"Could you do that?"

"What?" Loving somebody after he's dead?

"Forgiving a one night stand?"

"It was only physical."

"So it's alright with you?"

"No." Sara shook her head. "It is only physical for the one who's having the one night stand, it's a betrayal for the other one. Who tells you, it won't happen again? And if you really love your partner, you don't go to bed with somebody else."

"So you don't separate between love and sex."

"No, it belongs together for me." She only let somebody coming that close to her if she was in love or at least knew, she was on her way to fall in love. It was impossible for her to feel like that with somebody she'd just met. "Do you see it different?"

"Yes. I think, you can have sex with somebody you don't love but it will never be as good as with love. But when you're in a relationship, there's no way to have sex with anybody else than your partner. It's not only about trust, it's about respect. Normally you love the one you're with, you should have enough respect for the one you love to end a relationship before you sleep with anybody else."

"I guess that takes too much time for most people. Jumping into bed with somebody is faster and easier."

"It's cowardly. Shows your personality is weak, what makes you a weak person."

Sara took this private statement to make a personal comment about Sofia to see how she reacted. "And you are not a weak person."

"I'm weak in some points, but not in my character."

"Detective Curtis has weak spots in her life?" Sara couldn't help but was a little bit amused. "That can't be. A weak bad ass cop?"

"If you tell anybody I'll kill you."

"No, you won't. You keep your csi safe everything else would be a bad job. You don't allow yourself to do a bad job."

"I hate it when you're always right."

"Get used to it."

"One day. Back to the case. I'll go and contact his workplace for an appointment."

"I'll check what Doc Robins found out."

"Come over when you're done and we can go to Perry's house. If he's gone for two days there'll be a lot of hungry birds and I can't let animal control in before you were in."

"Right. Uhm…let's go there first." Sara hated the idea of starving birds. "Greg can update me, he and Warrick can do the lab stuff. I drive."

"Works for me, I call them from the car." Sara grabbed her kit and almost ran into Grissom on her way out.

"Slow down, it's not a Nascar route."

"We're off to Perry's house, there're probably starving birds. Can you tell Greg and Warrick I'm there?"

"Called animal control?"

"I'll do that from the car." Sofia said.

"Okay, I'll tell you the news."

"You? Don't you have enough other things to do?" Sara was surprised. There were a few new cases, she thought, Grissom was working on them.

"The Sheriff wants me to be the primary. I'm about to fight him for that…"

"Don't." Sara stopped him.

"It's your case, Sara."

"Lucky you, I'm in a sharing mood. It's all yours."

"You'll still work it."

"I know but the next time somebody has to talk to the press, it will be you, not me." Sara grinned and left Grissom standing in the hallway.

"That was smart." Sofia couldn't help herself but chuckled.

"That was ice cold."

"She's smart."

"Stop talking, move Curtis!" Sara yelled from the end of the hallway.

"She's still in charge as you can hear."

"If she gets bitchy I'll restrain her and send her in a black and white back to the lab."

"Now!"

"Sounds like she'll never leave the premises." Grissom smirked.

"Yeah, sounds like. See you later."

"Good luck."

Sofia didn't bother to ask if he meant for the case or for handling Sara or both. She jumped into Sara's car while she was already about to leave.

"Wohoo, you could wait with the driving until I'm in the car."

"If you stop wasting time you would be here in time. A little jump won't hurt you – or did you hit your ego on the door?"

"No, my ego is as smooth and elegant as I am."

"Sure." Sara grinned.

"Shut up and drive."

"Make the calls."

Sofia threw an evil look at Sara, who simply ignored that.

When they arrived at Jason Perry's house Sofia had finished all the phone calls she was supposed to do.

The house was in a quiet area all the neighbor houses had big gardens.

"Nice, plenty to space." Sofia looked around. The Perry house was surrounded by huge and thick hedges.

"I bet you can sit in the garden without hearing anything." Sara loved to have a place like that for herself later.

"He needed a quiet place as an ER nurse."

"Yeah, sleep is a holy thing."

"Sound familiar to me." They walked towards the door when Sofia suddenly stopped and grabbed Sara's vest.

"What…" The investigator started to protest and saw why Sofia had made her stop. The front door was open and it looked like it was a forced entry.

Sofia took her mobile and called for back-up.

"You stay here…no, no discussion."

"I'll stay behind you. I've got my gun and vest."

"Okay. Shoot first, then asked who is there."

"That's not what they teach you at the academy."

"I don't care. Safety first." Sofia opened the door with the gun in her hands. All her senses were alert. There was no noise in the house, there was no light. With their flashlights they entered the house. One look and they knew somebody had been in the place. The living room was turned upside down, everything seemed to be on the floor. With Sofia walking in front, looking for anybody and Sara right behind her, making sure nobody appeared out of the nowhere, they searched the whole house.

They finished all rooms when they heard the first black and white.

"I call Greg in, with all these chaos, I can need a hand."

"Okay. I get the guys to check the backyard." They had seen a shed just like Jonas Joston had one. "Thanks for securing my back."

"My pleasure. Can you make sure they don't destroy any evidence in the garden?"

"Okay, I'll let one in front of the door and take the other one with me in the garden." Sofia didn't like the idea of leaving Sara alone but the investigator was right, Sofia knew better than an officer how to secure evidence and what evidence was, when she saw it.

"Thanks." Sara switched on the lights and started to take photos of the living room. All the doors to the cupboards were open, whatever had been inside, was all over the floor, the couch laid upside down, pictures got ripped off the wall, cushion were torn and the filling all over the place, made it look a little bit like Christmas and snow.

Sara needed five minutes to take enough photos and then started to look for a computer or laptop. There was no office, so it was possible, Brandon Perry had his computer in here.

She moved to the desk in front of the window. No laptop, no computer.

"Sara? Got a minute?" Sofia was back from the garden.

"Sure." Actually she had not a minute, she had a lot to do but there had been a reason why Sofia asked her to come with her.

"I've got one officer in front of the door, two in the garden and one to keep the neighbors away. We seem to be an attraction. I talk to some of them later. Brass should be here any minute."

"Good, Greg's on his way too."

Sofia guided Sara to the shed and opened the door.

"Shit!" Sara had to chuck. There were dozens of birds and they were all dead. She took a closer look at the first cage. Four birds were in there, down on the ground.

"What happened here?"

"I don't know but the last time we know Brandon Perry's wife he was alive was last Thursday. It's a week, but I think, when they starved there should be a few who survived. How long can a bird survive without food?"

"I've no idea. Fuck." They were all dead.

"Animal control can go home."

"They didn't starve, look." Sara grabbed Sofia's sleeve. "There's plenty of food in the cages, there's enough water. They were fine. Somebody killed them."

"How?"

"Food and water provided, I don't know. Poison? Gas? Hell, if you're a really sick soul, you can break their neck one by one. And it would even fit the profile of our killer. He did that with human, why should he stop for birds?"

"He wouldn't."

"Exactly. I've to bag them, bring them to the lab, take the food, the water…"

"Sara!" Sofia grabbed Sara's firmly without hurting her. "Calm down. You can do that. Okay? Just take a second before you start." Sofia worried at that moment more about Sara than about the scene. The csi didn't look good. She was an animal lover that was a little bit too much maybe.

"Sorry, I lost it for a second."

"Alright. Maybe it's better when Greg does the shed."

"I can do my damn job." Sara's voice became angry.

"I'd never doubt that, you know that."

"Don't try to tell me how to do my job."

"I won't, there's no reason to do that, you're good at it. But I do care for you, if you like it or not. So I'm asking you to stay away from the edge."

"You walked in here without back-up."

"I had you. If Greg is with you in here, I'm fine with that. But I don't like the idea of having you in here alone and I can't stay."

"I don't need a babysitter"

"No, you surely don't and it's not about babysitting, you know that too."

"Stop being personal on the job."

"Can't do that. Sorry, there's no switch on me. A week ago I'd cared less, but that's a week ago. You have to live with that now. If you help people, they care for you. It's one of these awful things people do for each other. Caring. Like you cared for my safety, I care for yours."

Sara's eyes were blank, Sofia had no idea what the investigator was thinking.

"I started the living room, I can finish it."

"If you want I can stay here until Greg is there."

"No need, the officers are outside. Go and talk to the neighbors."

"I'll do that."

When Sara walked back in the living room she saw not only Greg but also Grissom.

"This looks like somebody was looking for something." Grissom said.

"The whole house looks like that." She remembered, Gil was now the primary, it was his job to be here. "Grissom, there's a shed full of dead birds in the garden. They didn't starve, there's enough water and food in their cages. Somebody killed them."

He understood what she was asking.

"I'll take care of that. You two will be busy enough in here."

"There's a printer and a scanner at the desk over there but no computer or laptop. Maybe it's in another room but I think, whoever was in here, took it."

"Like in the first case. They are similar." Grissom took his kit and left.

"Anything special you want me to do first?" Greg asked.

"No, it's all a mess. Mind if we work the rooms together? You can update me with the information you guys found out."

"No problem." He started to take prints from the desk. "Doc Robins confirmed the broken neck. The feathers are in traces but according to Grissom you were right, it's a black swan. His wings were tight to the shoulder blatters of the victim, our killer doctor even connect the muscles of the bird with the one of the human."

"He's getting closer to his goal, making bird and human one."

"Yes, it's scary. Blood is in DNA. Apart from the broken neck and the two wounds on the back, there weren't any injuries on the victim. He was healthy, his heart was in a good conditions, his liver looked like he never touched alcohol. He had four kidneys."

"Four?"

"Yeah, that was the only unusually thing about his body – well apart from the obvious things. Four healthy kidneys, no defensive wounds. Do you think these people wanted to have wings?"

"They were into birds, Iris White had told people she believed, one day they could fly. They wanted wings, the question is, how desperately?" Sara finished the doors of the cupboards. Ten prints.

"Did you ever want wings? I don't mean like the ones in our case, I mean like, I don't know. You spread your arms and fly like a bird."

"No. I believe if I was meant to fly, I'd have wings. I've got two legs, both perfectly healthy, so it looks to me, I'm supposed to walk. I don't have to mess with nature."

"The thought of flying never amazed you?"

"Buy a flight ticket and you can fly wherever you want. You even get served drinks and if you're lucky half decent food."

Greg started laughing. "I love talking to you, Sara."

"I love working with you, Greg. Now that we shared our love, tell me what you've got on the desk."

"Brandon Perry was a laptop person. No traces of a computer tower. Even if the killer or whoever took it, there would be traces like, less dusk, scratches, cables. And if you are after the computer, why take the scream? No scream, only one plug, means not enough for a tower and a scream means, laptop."

"Adapter and cable for the laptop?"

"Negative. But if it's a different model to the one the killer has, he needs it. This stuff here is for Apple, the chances the killer has not an Apple are quite big. Windows is still number one on the market."

"Yes. Archie has some more toys."

"He's busy with the email accounts at the moment. Maybe we'll get some answers in them."

"Hopefully. This case seems to be number one priority for everybody."

"Ecklie made sure it is. Beside Cath and Nick everybody is on it. New press update at ten this morning."

"I'm happy I'm not the primary anymore."

"Can't hold that against you. I going to bring this stuff and help you with the…mess on the floor. But I doubt there's anything the killer left."

Sara shared Greg's opinion. Their killer seemed to know what he was doing. He didn't make a mistake so far, it was unlikely he left something at the scene; they could use to get him.


	12. Chapter 12

Saturday morning / night

"Hey little Greggo, what do you think about breakfast?" Sofia was leaning against the door and smiled wide at Greg. It was eight o'clock; she had talked with all the neighbors so far. Nobody had seen anything regarding to the burglary or could tell them what happened to Brandon Perry. The best information she got was that a woman had seen him on Saturday morning and that one of his direct neighbors said, Perry's car was missing since that time.

The face of the young CSI, who was lifting some prints, went from pale to deep red back to pale.

"Uhm…I…we…I…sorry. Work."

"After work?" Sofia's voice was sweet as chocolate.

Greg looked to Sara, desperate for some help. Sara pretended, she didn't listen to the conversation and ignored the silent scream for help. She still wanted to know who Greg's secret love was, if Sofia's question could bring some light in this question, she was more than willing to let her friend die of fear.

"I…uhm…have to bring everything to the lab and then…I should get some sleep…it's a high profile case now…"

"You should relax more, mouse. I'll get you another time for the breakfast. Sara? Do you wanna stay here or come with me to the ER?"

Sara bagged the last book. Actually all she wanted to do was going home, catching some sleep.

"Yeah, we're almost done here. Or do you want me to stay Greg?"

"No! Take her and go. I mean you can go with Sofia…"

"Okay, see you later in the lab. Catch some sleep, Greggo." She smirked and her eyes laughed at Greg. He knew he had both women now at his back.

"You are mean." Sara started the engine.

"Me? Why?" Sofia's smile showed she knew exactly what Sara was talking about.

"Poor Greg, he felt like being your prey. Hunt down by the bad ass cop panther, no chance to escape knowing, he got eaten alive if he moves."

"Am I that scary?"

"To him? Yes."

"All I wanted was to play with him."

"That's what cats do before they kill the mouse. His thoughts were at this point too."

"Miaou."

"Stop that or I'll call animal control."

"Not a cat lover?"

"I like all animals. Come back to the case, detective. What did you find out?"

"He wasn't a people's person. His birds were the only ones who saw him after his wife left. He rarely showed up at neighbor activities. They blamed the divorce for that. Last time seen on Saturday morning, alone. His car is gone. Traffic has the plate, hopefully we'll find it fast. What about you guys?"

"I found your favorite books."

"Maximum ride. I should read it, they are so far the only thing the three victims had in common."

"Next to the birds and the DNA."

"Yes. Maybe there's something about this books, a web page, that is written about and somebody opened this page for real and they all meet there."

"How many books?"

"Five…I think. Or six."

"Get them as e-books."

"I prefer to read on paper."

"So do I. But if you're looking for internet pages, it's easier to use the e-book. Enter the words you're looking for and within seconds you've got all the information you need."

"That's why I like to work with you, you're so smart."

"Bite me." Sara pulled over in a parking space opposite of the Desert Palms.

"Not while we're working, later."

"I'm not scared of you, big black kitten."

"I can make you fear me."

"You won't, I'm your csi." When Sofia made a grimace Sara laughed. That what happened when you tell somebody too often, you'll take care of them.

"We've to talk to Doctor Magnus Gustavson. Sounds Swedish to me." She imagined a huge blond man with blue eyes and a cute Swedish accent. Like a Viking in a doctor's dress.

"Scandinavia, whatever country. You should be his type, blond and blue eyes."

"Don't they always want what they don't have? Scandinavia is the place for the blonde and blue-eyed people, so he should be after a brunette with brown eyes. Makes you his type."

"The blonde one always works."

"For you too?" Sofia's eyes showed Sara, she dared the investigator to answer that question.

"I'm attracted to intelligence and cleverness, nothing blondes are famous for." She shot Sofia a grin and left the car.

"Ouch." Sofia knew, she deserved this answer. They were playing with prejustice, blond and stupid was a famous one.

Doctor Magnus Gustavson himself didn't look like he was from Scandinavia. He had red, spikey hair and green eyes. He looked more Irish and he sounded like one. He reminded Sara of an Irish version of Greg.

"Doctor Gustavson, we appreciate the that you take some time for us, we try to keep it short, you're a busy man. That's Sara Sidle with the crime lab, I'm Detective Curtis, Homicide. I understand you were the supervisor of Brandon Perry?"

"That's right." The doctor signed a few forms and handed them to a nurse who walked past them.

"He had the weekend off, when he didn't come in on Monday we thought he's ill, when he wasn't there on Tuesday and didn't call, we tried to reach him, nobody answered the calls. We called his wife…ex wife the next day and she said, she reported him missing. Is he a victim of the serial killer? I saw a little bit of the press conference."

"Probably."

"How did he die?"

"His neck was broken."

"Any other wounds?"

"No." Sofia was cautious. Why did the doctor want to know how his colleague exactly died.

"At least he didn't suffer. A broken neck is not the nicest way to die but it's one of the least painful ones."

"Depends on how you got it broken." Sara said dryly. "And I think there's no nice way to die."

"Depends again on how you look at it. I've got a few kinds of dead I'd like to have for myself. Hearts attack while I'm sleeping for example. Fast, painless and no mess for the one who'll find me."

Sara looked skeptical.

"With whom did Brandon Perry spend his time? Any special colleague?"

"As far as I know not. He was good at his job, was very interested in my work the work of some colleagues, but he didn't meet anybody after work. At least not as far as I know."

"In the work of which doctors were he interested?"

"Surgery. We had once a doctor from New York here, who is famous for his great jobs on people who lost parts of their bodies. He was really into that stuff, how you exactly manage to operate a leg back to the body or even a face of a stranger. Nothing that came close to his job, but I appreciate it when my people are interested in a huge spectrum of medicine instead of only seeing their area."

"You know if he is in contact with this doctor?" Sara was very interested in that topic. DNA, human and bird were one thing, probably the vision of the future these three people had. What was in the present was the try to give them wings. They were in surgery for that, so whoever did that, must have some experience in this area. She made a mental note to ask Greg to narrow the list of doctors down to the ones, who were working in this area.

"I doubt that, he's a famous and busy doctor, he won't waste his time for a nurse. But I can try to find his contact details if you want. It seemed to be important for you."

"Everything is important to us."

"Do you happen to know anything about his private life?" Sofia asked.

"He's divorced, I met his ex wife once, nice woman. That's it."

"He never mentioned any other woman in his life? After he got divorced?"

"No."

"Did he go to meetings with his colleagues?"

"Not that I know, but then again, if he did, he went with the nurses, I go with my doctor colleagues. You have to ask his colleagues there."

"We will do that."

"I give you the list with their names."

It was ten o'clock when they left the hospital and both had been on the clock for twenty hours.

"There's no way I gonna write a report for Ecklie now." Sara said when she drove the car from the hospital car park.

"You're not the primary anymore, Grissom has to do that."

"Right." Sara sighed. "Shall I bring you back to the department or straight to your house? I'd invite you to breakfast, but I'm afraid I'd fall asleep in the diner."

"Same. If you pick me up before you go back to work I'd appreciate it when you bring me straight back home. Otherwise I'll get a black and white to bring me to the department later."

"We're on the same case, I can pick you up. What time?"

"You mean for the unlikely event nobody will call us in at lunch time? Four? I need at least five hours of sleep."

Sara took a look at Sofia. "Six?"

"Six hours would be even better."

"I mean six o'clock. We need eight hours in between our shifts." Her body told her, she needed more than eight hours but she couldn't listen to that now.

"I hope nobody will call us in earlier. Uhm…if you want, I can take the car and go home. You pass your place first, no need for you to drive past to my place and go back. Waste of quality sleep time."

"Five minutes."

"Ten return. I promise I won't steal your car."

"Really?" Sara shot Sofia an amused look. She didn't think the detective would steal a department car.

"Really." Sofia grinned. "And in case you need it, give me a call."

"Okay. Don't you dare to mess up my radio."

"What? To change from your all time favorite oldies to something more…modern? Don't worry, I like the sixties too."

"Yeah…who was it? Chuck Berry? Fats Domino? Or with whom did you sing the other day?"

"Little Richards and 'You make me wanna shout'? Great song. Do you like dancing?"

"I told, I don't date."

"First of all I never got a proper answer to that question, second it wasn't a question for a date, third stop becoming bitchy again. I enjoyed the relaxed Sara Sidle. Imagine a friend would ask you – without any thoughts behind it – if you like dancing. What would you answer?"

Sara chuckled. "I don't have friends who ask stupid questions like that."

"That's not a stupid question."

"If a friend would ask it, it would. Everybody who knows me knows what I like and what I don't like."

"What is with the people who would like to know you?"

"They have to prove they're worth getting me to know."

"What do I have to do to be on this list?"

"Why do you want to be on that list?"

"Did nobody tell you it's very rude to answer a question with another question?"

"Why did you do that yourself right now?"

"I'm desperate, tired and try to get an answer. I'm without coffee since hours and without sleep for…too long."

"You saved my life yesterday, that should qualified you."

"Really? Your life means so much to you? Apart from the fact, you had everything under control."

Sara grinned. "What was your original question? With all these other ones I forgot it."

"Do you like dancing?" Sofia wasn't sure if Sara was mocking her or really forgot the question. At least she didn't close up and was willing to give Sofia an answer.

"I'm not good at it but I do enjoy watching people dance to the right music."

"What would be the right music?"

"Your Little Richard is a good start. I like Rock'n Roll, I like Standard, the old style. Fits perfect to my radio station."

"Okay, I know I gonna regret to ask you this and I just do that because I lost my mind because of the lack of sleep and caffeine and in a few seconds I'll take over your car – I hope – to go home…"

"Get to the point, Sofia." Sara stopped her car. They arrived at her apartment.

"I know a place in Fremont Street where they play this kind of music. Care to go there one day? When we're both off duty."

Sara raised an eye brown and Sofia was ready for a harsh no. The brunette opened her door, stepped out of the car. Sofia did the same, walked around the car. At least, Sara didn't turn off the engine, it looked like Sofia could take the car home.

"Maybe." Sara grinned, turned and started walking away. "Be here on time, I want to be in the lab by six. Sharp."

"I will." Sofia jumped in the car and started driving. She had the feeling, she started to learn how to handle Sara Sidle. She was far away from figuring out how she ticked, but she seemed to get better in handling the complicated csi.

"Sidle, where have you been?" Sara rolled her eyes and turned slowly around. Ecklie was standing behind her.

"Home."

"You've got an open case."

"I know."

"You're supposed to work on it."

"I worked for twenty hours straight, if you want me to work and I mean actually working and not being here and overseeing everything because I'm overtired, then I need some sleep every now and then. It's not always working with coffee."

"Eight hours."

"Yes, I slept most of the time, seven hours to be exact. I skipped breakfast and lunch, came straight back to here."

"And she isn't the primary anymore." Grissom came out of his office. He had seen Sara and Ecklie and knew, he had to do something before the situation escalated.

"I'm here to answer all your questions, Conrad."

"I want her report."

"We worked the house together, you know everything from this scene and I'm sure, if Sara had found anything important in the hospital, she had told us. Sara?"

"He was a loner, like the other ones. The only interesting thing is, he was into medicine, I mean, more than he was supposed to be for his job. They had a doctor over who does the surgeries on people who need to get their hand, arm or whatever back. According to Perry's supervisor, Perry was all over this man, wanted to know everything about his job. I've got the number of the doctor, but Perry's supervisor was sure, Perry had no contact to him. I'll call him anyway to make sure."

"Good."

"Perry didn't hang out with his colleagues, they knew about his birds, they knew his ex wife, that's it. I'll write my report now if there's nothing else to do."

"Do it." Ecklie walked away.

"You're alright?" Grissom looked at Sara.

No she wasn't she had a headache again and it was knocking behind her right eye, make her wanting to blink it all the time.

"You don't have to save me from Ecklie."

"I know but I want to. I'm not only your friend, I'm also your boss and if somebody attacks my csi, I want to know why and if this person has any right to do so. If Ecklie wants you to be told off for whatever, he has to come to me and I'll do that. I'm the one who's supposed to slap your fingers, Sara."

She held her fingers in front of him. "Go ahead."

"I've no reason to do so."

"Means?"

"Means, go and write your report, send it straight to him and make him shut up." Sara smirked.

She walked to her computer and started writing. Ecklie was a pain in the ass. She was in the mood to write the report very slowly and send it to him in a few hours to let him cook a little bit more. But Grissom had told her to write it now, so she would do it. Otherwise he'd be in trouble too.

"Ikarus, Hermes and Max." Greg came to her only a few seconds after she had sent the report. His hair spikey, a too colorful shirt under his lab coat.

"I beg your pardon?"

"What do these names mean to you?"

"They mean…" Her stomach grumbled.

"You're hungry."

"No time for lunch."

"Want some sweets? I've got a candy bar."

"No need." Grissom came with a few boxes of pizza in the room. "Veggie pizza for Sara meat lover for Greg, Hawaii for Warrick and Italian for me. I think we're all hungry."

"What's wrong with you?" Sara asked suspicious. "Since when are you feeding us?" She was used to that when they were together. He had always made sure, she gets something to eat but they weren't together anymore. Were friends also supposed to feed each other?

"Since you're too busy to do it yourself."

"Well, thanks." She took a big bite and moved her attention back to Greg. "Ikarus flew too high, his false wings caught fire when he was close to the sun. Hermes was the delivery guy of the guys, messenger boy."

"What a sloppy way to explain good old Hermes." Grissom grinned. "A little bit more respect, he was important."

"Sure. You want to go on, Gris? To pay all the respect to Max."

"Unfortunately I've no idea who Max is."

"See, if you would read the stuff we bag as evidence, you'd know. Max is a girl in a fantasy-fiction of James Patterson, Maximum Ride. She's 98 percent human and two percent bird, means she has got wings. Wings, that were with her since her birth, exactly what our victims dreamed of. She and her friends with the same little extra, fight against a few evil people and some other strange creations, like wolf-human."

"And you know this why?" Grissom asked surprised. He had never thought, Sara would read something like that.

"Beside the fact we bagged these books in each case and I know my evidence very good? Sofia told me about it, she read one of these books or one that was related to it. That reminds me, I wanted to find them as e-books, she wanted to find out if they can help us. Like, if there's web page mentioned, that somebody in reality created and now tries to make the rest of the books real."

"After all these years you can still surprise me."

"I'm full of surprises, Gris."

"I'll have a look at these books, maybe they are the key."

"Do we know why all the birds at Perry's place were dead?"

"Poison." Greg said. "Potassium cyanide. Somebody mixed it in the food."

"Damn it, my pizza is cold." Warrick dropped himself on a free chair.

"I paged you minutes ago."

"I had to finish my work first. Talking about these birds, there were no traces of a black swan."

"Like there were no eagle at Joston's house and no peacock in White's room." Grissom closed his pizza box. "That means our killer provides all these birds, has them at home or organized them. I assume, these three name you gave us, Greg, are related to our victims?"

"Yes. Archie managed to find out that Iris White called herself Max in a local community about birds. Actually in all of them. She used the same name for the DNA community. Hermes and Ikarus were in the same communities, they both had Las Vegas as home town and there's no action with their names since they disappeared. The possibility that these are our guys is big, but Archie is working on the IP address to make sure. After that he'll find out with whom all three of them had contact, who wrote whom private messages and if there's anything in their posts that shows us, they met each other. Or anybody else."

"Joston's and Perry's laptops were stolen, that means, there must be anything on it, that the killer doesn't want us to find. Why didn't he get Whites too?"

"Maybe he tried but her room mate was there?" Warrick suggested.

"Her room mate isn't the type you can trust with your things. If anybody showed up, told her, he's a friend of Iris, the laptop would have been his within seconds. All lovely Rachel cares for is herself."

"The killer didn't spend the time on White as he spent on the other two. It looked like she wasn't worth the effort. Maybe he was sure, she didn't know anything that might bring us to him." Grissom got up. "What is with the relatives of Brandon Perry? Beside the ex wife?"

"Sofia talks to the parents today." Sara said.

"Good. Anything else? Got something new from the first two victims?"

"No. Grissom, where would you get an eagle, a peacock and a black swan?"

"In the mountains, in the forest, on the beach."

"Where do you have all these three things together?"

"In the zoo."

Sara smiled. "I'm sure they've got a night line. I'll call them and also the one in San Diego and Los Angeles. Greg, can I have your list with bird places in Vegas and around?"

"Most of them will be closed."

"There'll be a morning tomorrow and I'm sure Ecklie doesn't want me to go home on time. I'll have enough time to visit all these places or give them calls."

"If you go there, take Sofia with you." Grissom said.

"Why?"

"First of all for security reasons, one of the employees or employer could be the killer, they are all suspects. Second, the two of you worked together so far most of the case, you went to most of the witnesses together, no need to change that. And third, she was a csi, it's like having a second pair of eyes with you and a bodyguard in one. She's handy."

"Yesterday she was beautiful, today she's handy. Grissom, is there anything we should know?" Sara grinned amused.

"Yes, there is."

"What?" Greg's chin was almost on his chest. Was Grissom about to say what he believed? Was Greg about to be a witness of a love statement from Gil Grissom? The one, who was famous for not talking about private life.

"Owls can see the color blue and Will E. Coyote managed to catch the Road Runner only once and that was on the twenty-first of May 1980." He smiled and left.

Warrick, Greg and Sara looked at each other in disbelieve.

"Is he kidding us?" Warrick asked.

"I think so." Sara smiled. She had to admit when Grissom answered with a yes to her question, her heart stopped beating for a second. Why was she curious if there was something between Sofia and Gil? They were both singles, she knew Gil was fond of Sofia as a csi and a detective and Sofia had tried to impress Gil. Nothing new for her so far. But a relationship between the two of them? Somehow that seemed to be wrong.

"Can the Road Runner fly?" Greg asked.

"I don't think so, all he can do is running." Warrick said.

"So is any of the stuff Grissom told us related to our cases?"

"I doubt but it's Gris, you never know until you know."


	13. Chapter 13

"I had a few minutes with your supervisor" Sofia got herself some coffee and leaned next to Sara who was working on her list about birds around Las Vegas.

"He thinks you're beautiful and handy."

"Handy? Like a tool?" Grissom thought she is beautiful? Did she miss something? He didn't seem to be more interested in her than usually.

"Handy like a two in one: csi and bodyguard."

"Oh."

"I'm sorry is that was not the explanation you were hoping for."

"Actually I wasn't hoping for anything."

"Then you won't be disappointed. Anything new about the case?"

"Not so far. I'm your personal Hermes at the moment."

"What's your message, delivery girl?"

"Go home."

"What?" Sara turned around in disbelieve.

"Go home."

"Ecklie will kill me if I think about that."

"Ecklie wants you to go to all the places you've on your list. He knows you need some sleep before you can go there. Means, the handy beautiful csi bodyguard has to go home too. Grissom wants me to come with you, Whitney."

"In that case, Kevin." Sara moved her eyes back to the computer. "I'll see you in the morning."

"Sara, you need some sleep."

"I know, but I need a second to complete this list otherwise we don't have it complete."

"Need a hand?"

"Aren't you off the clock after you told me to go home?"

"Yes, I am."

"Don't waste your time."

"I'd like you to be off the clock too, bitch. So tell me what to do and we'll both out of here in a few seconds and you have to buy me a proper coffee. This stuff is bad."

"I know. Unfortunately Greg took his coffee with him."

"That's mean."

"Yes."

"So?"

"Okay, I'm at the letter 'U', I'll tell you the name and address of the place, you mark it down on the list and we can go there one after one without wasting time driving around in circles."

"Sounds good to me."

It took them ten minutes to complete the list. Another two to leave the building and go to their cars.

"Where do you want your coffee from?" Sara closed her eyes. The headache got worse since her time in front of the computer. She had known it wasn't a good idea to work on it but it had to be done."

"Are you alright?" Sofia stopped next to the brunette and took a closer look at her.

"Yeah, I'm fine."

"Don't lie to me. And if you do, do it better that I don't see it. It's your head, isn't it? I saw you rubbing your temple, closing your eyes and it was obvious, you had problems to concentrate."

"Am I a suspect?"

"A victim. Give me your keys."

"What?"

"Give me your keys." Sofia's voice was calm.

"Why?"

"Sara, you won't drive. Give me your goddamn keys or I'll take them."

"Are you threatening me?"

"Yes."

Sara's eyes became small. "Don't you ever dare…"

"The keys." Sofia opened her hand. "Please."

"I can drive."

"Didn't say you can't."

"So why do you want to have my keys?"

"I'm selfish. I know you can drive but I can't let you drive, wouldn't make me feel good. Please."

"You can follow me and make sure I arrive safely home."

"Please." Sofia's eyes caught Saras. The csi could see the sorrow in Sofia's eyes.

"Fuck that." She dropped the keys in Sofia's hand.

"I love your sensitive way with words."

"Don't dare me, Sofia."

"Me? Never. Come on, I bring you home."

"That's becoming a habit." Sara grumbled and got on the passenger seat of Sofia's car after she placed her kit in the back.

Sofia made the decision to ignore that and hid a smile. She was happy to have Sara in her car, the brunette wasn't in a good shape, having her on the strip with that headache and all the looneys out there, was too dangerous. And if Sara wasn't sensible, then Sofia had to be it for both of them.

She turned off the engine in front of Sara's apartment.

"Time for a another massage."

"I'll take some pills."

"That wasn't an offer."

"It was because you can't force me."

"Stop fighting something you want to just to be a stubborn bitch."

"Bite me."

"I might do that after the massage. Move."

"Pain in the ass." Sara sighed. Okay then, she'd take the massage. Would make her sleep faster too. If Sofia wanted to waste her valuable time on Sara's headache, it was her problem.

"I know but I still like you somehow." Sofia chuckled and caught the vest Sara threw at her.

"If you want to strip for me, do that in the house. I'll put up a sign and we make some money with that."

"Keep your pervert dreams to yourself."

"I don't dream of you stripping in your apartment in front of hundreds of paying people. I guess that would be even for Hodges a weird dream."

"Sure you're not related to him?"

"That was under the line, Sara."

"I know. Sorry." Sara opened her door and walked straight to the kitchen. "Coffee?"

"No thanks. And to risk to get in trouble again, you should get yourself something else too."

"What mum? Milk and honey?"

"No need to punish you. Take a juice or water, I'd take one too."

Sara came back with two little cold bottles of orange juice.

"Thanks."

"You're welcome."

"Take your shower, dress up for me and I'll get you relaxed."

"Careful with your words, detective. You start to sound like Hodges again." Sara couldn't help herself but smiled thinly.

"I'm always careful with everything."

"Sure you are." Sara left the bottle on the table half full and vanished in the bathroom. Five minutes later she came out in her boxers and the white shirt, having a pillow and a blanket in her arms.

"You can go to your bed again."

"I know you'll stay here."

"I beg your pardon?" Sofia almost chucked her juice.

"Bad luck, detective. You didn't want me to drive, I don't want you to drive neither. Only God knows how long you gonna stay, I hope not again two hours that's crazy. There's a towel for you in the bathroom, some things for sleeping and here's your lovely bed." She dropped everything on the couch. "It's a sleep couch, not too bad, I do occasionally enjoy sleeping on it. You won't go home."

"You'll be asleep, you can't control that."

"You'll stay."

"Or?"

"No or. You'll stay. If you want the relaxed Sara, you'll stay. If you leave, I'm afraid the old bitch will come back."

"Blackmailing."

"I do love it."

"I can tell you do and you're a master."

"You stay?"

"For Christ's sakes yes."

"Good. I set the alarm of eight, most places open at nine, we'll have six hours of sleep. Let's get started."

"You know, you're really annoying."

"I know and it's one of my nicer personalities."

**Sunday afternoon**

The smell of fresh brewed coffee entered Sofia's nose and from there her brain. Coffee. What a lovely way to get woken up. But how…she opened her eyes. That wasn't her bedroom, that wasn't her living room. Did she…?

"Good morning, sleeping beauty." That wasn't the voice of her mother who had surprised her with a visit.

"Sara?"

Sara started laughing by the look of Sofia's face.

What the hell was she doing here? Oh right, Sara's headache and the brunette didn't want her to drive.

Sara brought Sofia a cup of coffee to the couch. She was dressed and looked relaxed. Sofia could tell by the look at Sara's eyes, there was no headache.

"How did you sleep?"

"Good." Yes, she slept well. Actually better than the nights before in her own bed. "Your sofa is really comfortable."

"I know. I sleep here sometimes when I've got the night off and make a private movie marathon. I picked this couch on purpose, was sick of the old one that gave me a sore back whenever I fell asleep on it."

"Good buy.

"Yes. What do you want for breakfast?"

"Why do I get the full service?"

"I'm without any pain, gonna pay you for that. Toast? Eggs? I don't have bacon. Fruits? Muesli?"

"I'll eat whatever you eat."

"Okay."

Sofia got up. It was already half eight. An extra half an hour.

"We're running late." Luckily she took her shower before she went to sleep.

"No, we won't. Get some more coffee if you want. Cream and sugar are on the bench. Sunny side down?"

"Uhm, yes." She watched Sara turning the eggs. "I could get used to this. Lovely wake up service in the morning, coffee delivered to my bed, breakfast fresh made."

"Get a husband and you've got a personal slave."

"Most of the times guys expect you to do all these things for them. This friendly service usually stops as soon as they had you in bed. So why should I waste my time with that when I've got you?"

"I don't want you in my bed." She served the eggs on toast with some fresh fruits. Both ignored the dinner table and sat on the stools at the bench.

"You want my hands on you while you are in your bed."

"When you say it this way it sounds like I want to have sex with you."

"It's all in your imagination, what you read out of these words. It could be a harmless massage too."

"It was a harmless massage, nothing else. At least I hope for your well-being there was nothing else. I was fast asleep. Hit me suddenly."

"I know, I pressed the right spots to send you to sleep. Thought, you need your sleep."

"You knocked me out to make me helpless." Sara raised an eye brown. Being in America she could sue Sofia for that probably.

"Guilty."

"Under other circumstances that would make me very angry. I try this time something new, I trust you, you didn't do anything I wouldn't agree on."

"I won't disappoint your trust. I loosed a few tensions, paid some special attention to your temples and was on the couch half an hour later. Satisfied?"

"Yes."

"You're a good cook, by the way."

"It's only eggs on toast."

"Believe me, I woke up some mornings and got stuff served, that was a disaster and it was nothing else than eggs on toast. From burned to half frozen, all happened."

"You should choose your guys more carefully in that case." Sara grinned.

"It weren't only guys. Women are not much better." Sofia watched Sara's reaction. The brunette seemed to ignore it, no question how Sofia meant that, no surprise. Sofia wasn't sure if she was herself surprised by Sara's non-reaction or relieved. After all, it was Sara, nobody knew what could change her mood in seconds.

"Well, you don't have to recommend me, I don't want to be in the breakfast business."

"Nah, I keep you as a secret spot. I prefer to have my breakfast in peace, don't like crowded places, especially when I just woke up. First a few sips of coffee than talk."

"Sounds familiar to me. Bad luck when you wake up next to somebody who's the opposite."

"That would be a relationship that is over after one week. The chances are high it ends with a body."

"Is the detective dreaming about killing somebody?" Sara chuckled.

"Sometimes, yes. Like the people moving like snails on the left side of the highway are one of my favorites targets."

"Understandable."

"Who would you like to kill?"

"Besides Ecklie? Most of the times it's you, especially the last couple of days." Sara smirked.

"I'm slightly concerned now. If I hadn't sent you asleep, what did you plan to do to me? What was the reason, the real reason, why you wanted me to stay?"

"Imitate Doc Robins? Lovely y-cut maybe. I've got some really sharp knives here." She opened a drawer with a dozen knives in different shapes and sizes.

"Okay, I think I've to go now." Sofia grinned.

"Indeed, you have. In fact, we have. It's almost nine o'clock, time to see the birds."

"I'm not sure if I want to be in a car with you."

"Oh, you do. You love spending time with me, Sofia." Sara took Sofia's plate and brought it to the dish washer.

Sofia watched her without a word. She had lost her voice for a few seconds. Sara's last sentence took it away. Yes, Sofia liked spending time with Sara, when she was honest, she really did. At least as long as the investigator wasn't in one of her bitchy moods. This morning it was really pleasant to spend time with her.

"Ready?"

"Bird human or not, here we come."

* * *

Note of author: Hey guys this story will be over in a few chapter. If anybody is interested to be my beta reader for the next one I'd appreciate it. And as it looks like I might be without internet from the middle of February for a little while so if anybody could upload the chapters for me, the story could go on without a break.

Fleppy85


	14. Chapter 14

Their first stop was an animal shop, only a few blocks from Sara's apartment away. They weren't specialist in birds and weren't a big help either. The women decided to hit the bird places first and then the rest.

The third shop they went in to started promising.

Sara showed the clerk photos of Joston, White and Perry and he recognized the two men.

"Are they regular customer?"

"They came in once a week, bought quite a lot of food, had a few birds." The clerk was in his fifties, had thick glasses and his hair was gray.

"You sell also birds?"

"Yes, we've got one of the biggest selection in town."

"Do you have eagles?"

"It's illegal to sell eagles."

"We pretend we're not the police." Sofia said "And all you tell us now we can't remember as soon as we are back in our jobs. Do you have eagles?"

"No."

"Peacocks?"

"No."

"A black swan?"

"No. I've got budgies…"

"We are interested in big birds."

"The biggest one I've got is falcon. I can only sell them to a registered person." Right now the man wasn't helpful. If it was because he had no idea where to get the birds they were interested in or because he was lying, Sofia wasn't sure.

"Where do we get eagles, peacocks and black swans?"

"In the zoo, I'd guess."

"Called them, they have them but none is missing." Sara took a look at the books in a shelf.

"Where else?" Sofia wasn't willing to let go.

"I don't know."

"This is Vegas, you get everything with enough money. So let's imagine, I've got a lot of money, where would I go to get these birds? Where would you go if I send you with a lot of money to get me these birds?"

"Beside the fact that I wouldn't do that…I'd go out in the mountains, pay a park ranger to get an eagle I guess, it's more expensive when you want the eagle alive. Do you want them alive?"

"Doesn't matter." At least Sofia thought so. "All I care for is that the wings are in perfect conditions."

"Catch them alive. A peacock should be easiest. You'd get them on a farm. There's a farm a few miles out of Vegas that have quite a few."

"I need that address."

"Can look that up for you, detective. What was the third one?"

"A black swan."

"Some casinos have them, but white ones. Black ones are native in Australia, really beautiful animals. I've no idea where you would get one in Vegas. Don't say they are not here, but if they are, they are hold in private hands."

"I've got a lot of money."

"Contact a zoo, search the internet for national trader, specialist in exotic birds, call them, place an order and let them worry how to get one. Maybe they fly to wherever and organize one."

"You don't know any place in Vegas?"

"No."

"What do you think about flying, Mister Peters?" Sara asked.

"Me? As a person? I hate it! Can't get even close to a plane. Don't have wings so I'm not supposed to fly. Don't mess with the work of God."

"You don't dream of flying?"

"Nah, as I said, I prefer the earth. I love birds, love watching them fly but they are meant to fly. Everybody should stick to the place they belong to. Me it's the earth. I also have no fins, so I don't swim."

"A human can swim without any technical help."

"Yeah but if we were meant to do so, we'd have fins and gill to breathe under water. We're land animals."

Sara and Sofia looked at each other. This man seemed not to be one of the flying bird fans.

He looked up the address of the farm with the peacocks.

It wasn't really a great help but at least they had some answers and ideas. Park rangers for an eagle. Greg had to find out where the next place was you could see eagles.

After noon they were back in the department. Greg had worked on a list with eagles and park rangers.

"None of the clerks could help?"

"No, they had no idea where to get these birds, or at least they didn't tell us. There's peacock farm out of the city, I've checked their web page, let the employees run through the system. So far nothing."

"Doc Robins found out, there was bird blood in the system of the last victim?"

"What?"

"Yes, another step to become a bird, get bird blood in your system. It was not much, but it caused some troubles. How crazy do you have to be to mix your blood with bird blood?"

"Totally?" Sara shuddered. What an awful thought, having the blood of birds in your system.

"From the swan?"

"Yes."

"There were no traces in the other victims?"

"No, we checked it again."

"Do you think there's somebody out there with a lot of bird blood in their system?"

"Not alive."

"I wonder if they wanted to have the blood injected."

"They were crazy about birds, I can imagine, they wanted it."

"You have to be very crazy to want something like this."

"Yes."

"Like you with your secret love."

Greg smiled.

"Who is it?"

"Still not your business. Or are you jealous? Sorry Sara, you had your chance, you didn't take it now it's too late."

"That breaks my heart."

"Don't play with my feelings."

"Who, Greg?"

"I'll tell you one day, unfortunately today is Sunday and not one day."

"Bite me."

"I'd have done that – then."

"You are…"

"Sorry to interrupt you guys." Sofia came in the room. "I've got two names. Harry Regies, he works in the zoo. He's there right now, I called his supervisor. Sara, let's go."

"Why don't you take Greg with you?" She enjoyed the panic in the face of her friend.

"Ivetostayinthelab" Greg said as fast as possible.

Sofia managed to hide a smile. Under other circumstances she'd play with Greg, but not now. They had to go.

"Leave the mouse here, he might end up as a lunch for an eagle…or a panther. Let's go."

"Okay." She looked at Greg. "We're still not done here, Greggo."

"Bye Sara."

Sara grabbed her kit. "Who's number two?"

"Donald Lee Marvin, he works as a park ranger. I've got an address, but I don't think it's a house, anyway, it's the only thing I could get with his name. Brass is working on more."

"So we go and see the zoo guy first?"

"Yes. Maybe there'll be another guy, Brass was on two more. But first the zoo guy, he should be the one, who could get all three birds without a problem."

Sounds like you found the case breaker."

"Brass did."

"Right, he's higher in rank."

"Doesn't matter."

"Of course it does."

Will you shut up and drive?"

"Will you be a captain one day?"

"Yes and I'll arrest you. Annoyance."

"Sure you will." Sara set the indicator. "Do they have all these birds in the zoo?"

"Yes, they do. The guy I spoke to couldn't tell me if one was missing, it's Regies who takes care of them. If he doesn't report a bird missing it takes some time until anybody else notices."

"What a great system."

"His supervisor promised to check inconspicuously if a bird is missing. I hope he's not too obvious inconspicuous."

"Some people are, yes."

Sara stopped the car next to the entrance of the zoo. With Sofia's badge they could go inside without a problem. Rudy McHolster was already waiting for them.

"I count the birds." Was the first thing he said. "All are there." That was good for the zoo bad for Sara and Sofia. That made the guy less interesting as a suspect. Nevertheless, they'd talk to them. Maybe he could help them.

"Thanks Mr. McHolster, I'm Detective Curtis, that's Sara Sidle of the crime lab. Where can we find Mr. Regies?"

"In the cage with the eagles. Two of them."

"Which way?"

"Straight down and then left. There're signs. Shall I come with you?"

"No, we'll be fine. Thanks."

"When was the last time you were in a zoo?" Sofia asked when they walked down the path.

"A long time ago. I'm not sure if I like them or not. Animals don't belong in cages, they're often too small for them. On the other side some animals wouldn't exist anymore if they weren't be in a zoo."

"Yeah, we need more national parks to keep the animals in their environment." Sofia stopped in front of the cage of the eagles. A man was in there, sweeping. He was tall, had long black hair and was with his back t them.

"Harry Regies?" Sofia called out.

"Yeah?" He turned around.

"Detective Curtis, LVPD, we've got some questions for you."

The guy made no signs to run away, but where could he go? He was in a cage, a closed one.

"Ask."

"Mind to step out?"

"No." He took the broom and came out of the cage. "What can I do for the police?"

"We're interested in birds. Eagle, peacocks and black swans."

"We have them here."

"We know that."

"So?"

"So, tell us about them."

"What do you want to know? They're quite different."

"Where would you get them if not here?"

"You mean like at one place? Another zoo."

"And?"

"Nowhere else. Why would you have them at home? You can have a swan and a peacock on a farm, the eagle will take off."

"Are you in a community on the internet about birds?"

"Yes, I am."

"Do you know Max? Ikarus? Or Hermes?"

"Shit, yes. Haven't heard from any of them for a week. Wonder where they are. Why? How do you know them?"

"We found their dead bodies."

"What?" He looked in disbelieve at the two women.

"Yes."

"They are…are they….the three dead people, right. I didn't know their real names, so I made no connection. Shit. Who killed them?"

"We're trying to find that out."

"And why are you…shit, you think I?"

"It's an idea. At least you knew the all three."

"I knew their internet names, I had no idea who they were in reality."

"Easy to say but I believe for now." Sofia had not that feeling the man was lying. "Tell me more about the internet community."

"We're bird fans, love them. Max, Hermes and Ikarus were extreme, they were always talking about how great it would be to fly as well. Guess they were a little crazy about that."

"Who else was that crazy?"

"You must know the page, there're some weird people…"

"You know them better."

"Uhm…there's this thread about flying. They all wrote a lot in it, so do a few other people. I think they're around five or six. All want to fly, funny to read."

"You don't take them serious?"

"No way, I think, they're joking. One of them built some wings with plastic, jumped from a rock and twisted his ankle. He uploaded a video of it. Some people do this crazy stuff…"

"But?" Sofia could feel there was something else he held back.

"But I read one post from a guy who called himself the Human Bird Maker. He said if they really want to have wings and fly, he could do that. That was the only thing he ever wrote. First I thought he's a show off but somehow…he sounded so serious, very creepy."

"Any idea who he is?"

"No."

"You guys don't meet?"

"No, not as far as I know. It's only about birds and fun."

The fun that probably killed three people. Not the fun Sara and Sofia enjoyed.


	15. Chapter 15

„Donald Lee Marvin, forty-seven, park ranger since five years, former doctor." Sara read the file about their next suspect.

"With three names he's perfect as a serial killer." Sofia finished her coffee. "Are you sure we're in the right area?" The place they were looked empty and sad. A lot of sheds, container and old buildings, most of them broken, full of graffiti or broken windows.

"According to your file, this is his last address. You don't make mistakes."

"I heard that little sharp tone below your words."

"Which tone?"

"That one. I do make mistakes, we all make mistakes, but I try not to make them too often. Maybe I mixed up the street numbers?"

"Would be still the same old disgusting area."

"Have you seen anything that looked like a house?"

"No. Not since five minutes. This is old industry area. I didn't know Vegas had that."

"Of course they do."

"Yeah I mean so huge. The desert starts right behind this. You've to turn left."

"We're almost in the dessert."

"There it is." Sara looked at the address Sofia had printed out and the building. No name or number was written on it, but her computer printout showed, it was the last building on this street. A middle sized shed, full with pictures and obscene words. Trash and old car pieces were all over the place.

"Lovely." Sofia stopped the car and got out. The heat hit them hard.

"Shit. How hot is it today?"

"One-ten?" Sara was happy she wore only a top under her vest. As soon as you left an air-conditioned place, you started to sweat.

"Whoever lives here – if somebody lives here – must hate people. This must be the most isolated place to live if you don't live in a desert." Sofia wished her sunglasses were even darker.

"Our victims weren't social either. If he has some air-con in this shed, it's a perfect place to hold birds. This shed is around twenty times bigger than Perrys." They were looking for a big place. A place to hold big birds.

"Let's hope we won't find a lot of dead animals again." They walked slowly in direction of the shed. No entry was visible yet.

"Still looks lost to me."

"Not that lost." Sara found a lock on a door. The lock was the first thing in this area, that didn't look old and rusty. She took a photo.

"It's a start." If there was no other door, they'd try their luck here.

"You know, all these birds and human and DNA thing makes me wonder how fucked up a human mind can be."

"You're a scientist, working for the crime lab, you know, there are no limits."

"Yeah, every time you thing it can't get worse, people can't take it further, they prove you wrong. One thing the human race is very reliable in."

"Sometimes they surprise you in a nice way." Sofia smiled.

"Seldom."

"Usually you surprise me in a nice way. Might be because I'm used to all your bad moods and surprised when you're in a good one."

"Don't make the good mood disappear."

"I try not to. There's another door."

Sara's mobile started ringing.

"Hey Gil."

"Sara, where are you guys?"

"Uhm, out in the nowhere, almost in the desert, the place our suspect is supposed to live but it doesn't look like he or anybody else is living here."

"Greg found out, he talked to all three victims, he's HBM, the human bird maker. Aka Nervous Neil."

„Nervous Neil?"

„That was a name he got in prison. He stayed there after he killed somebody, he shoot a man. His index finger is supposed to be very nervous, probably he killed more than one person. He was a suspect in other cases but the evidence wasn't enough. You two are meeting a killer. I want you to wait for back-up."

"Okay." That was more than fine with her. She had no death wish.

Sara closed her mobile. "That was Gil…"

They heard something crashing in the shed. Both got their guns out.

"Somebody's home." Sofia said.

"That was Gil. Our somebody is probably a serial killer. And he was that before he started to kill human birds. He was in prison as Nervous Neil, nervous index finger. We're supposed to wait for back-up."

A window broke.

"If this guys heard your mobile, he knows who we are and why we're here. I've to get him now before he's away." Sofia shot the lock at the door.

"You stay here!"

"No way!"

"Sara, that's an order! I'm the detective, I've to secure the scene you've to stay here until I allow you to go in. Stay! I mean it."

"Sofia, it's his shed, he can be hiding anywhere and you run into his trap."

"That's the risk of my job. I won't endanger you by letting you come inside. Stay out, Sara!"

"Then at least take my vest."

"What?"

"You heard me. You're without a vest, if I've to stay here until there's no danger, I don't need a vest." Sara took of her vest and gave it to Sofia who took it.

"Okay, but then you'll stay here?"

"Yes, I do."

"Good. Send them in ASAP." She kicked the door open and vanished in the dark.

Sara took her mobile.

"Gil, where's the back-up?"

"We're on our way."

"Sofia is in the shed."

"What? I told you…"

"I told her, but we believe, the suspect is on the run. She didn't want to risk him to escape."

"Where are you?"

"Outside the shed."

"Stay there. If he comes out of the door, shoot. Otherwise stay there until we're there. Understand?"

"Understand."

How she hated to wait. Where were they? Gil never told her exactly where they were, not the best sign in her opinion. There was no sound of a police car and this was a very quiet area. Too quiet when you thought, that there were two people with guns inside the shed. Sara took some cover behind a rusty barrel. Better than nothing even when she believed, every bullet would just run through this thing.

She wanted to contact Sofia, was too afraid, that might blew her cover. Why had she to stay outside? Why did she agree? Damn it.

Where was the back up? Sofia was in there since a minute, the longer she was in, the more dangerous it was and…

Gunfire. Sara went down, covered her head. Somebody was shooting. She heard at least four shots and two different guns. Another one.

She took her phone. "Gil, we need you guys."

"Almost there."

"They're shooting inside. Be there!"

"Give us a minute."

"I hope Sofia has the minute. Call in ambulance, they…another shoot. A scream. Sofia?!?

"Fuck!" Sara kept her mobile on. There was no way she'd stay outside. It was Sofia she'd heard. She needed help.

With her gun she went in the shed, blind for the first seconds. The bright sunlight had made her eyes sensitive, she closed them to get used to the darkness. Faster. She had no time. Sofia had probably no time.

"Police!" Sara shouted. This way Sofia knew, she was coming and whoever was shooting too, knew, back up was there.

It wasn't that dark anymore after her eyes got used to the shed. A little bit of sunlight was coming through dirty windows on the top and showed Sara what was around her. Boxes, empty cages, a lot of feathers. Yes, here were birds or maybe here are still birds.

A crash of glass made Sara go down. No shoot, but she heard footsteps on glass. Somebody had crashed a window and was running.

She walked cautiously in the direction of the crash. No more steps, no more gunfire. No sign of Sofia. Where was she? Why didn't she respond to Sara's shout? Was she close to the shooter and didn't want to loose her cover?

"Sofia!" No! Sofia was on the floor. Blind and without taking care of her cover, Sara ran in the direction of the detective, grabbing her mobile, hoping Gil was still on the phone. "Officer down! Officer down! Get the paramedics! Now!"

She dropped down on her knees next to Sofia.

"Sofia?" There was blood on her forehead. If a bullet had…no, no bullet wound, at least Sara couldn't see one but there was so much blood.

"Didn't I tell you to stay out?" Sofia's eyes opened a little bit. Her voice was barely to hear.

"I couldn't let you in here alone. I heard your scream and…what happened?" Sara took Sofia's hand and held it.

"Got a bullet." Sofia pressed Sara's hand but she had barely the power to do so.

"Where?" Panic was all over Sara. "I called the back-up, they'll get you to the paramedics. Just stay with me and everything will be alright…"

"Sara?"

"Yes?"

"It's in the vest…secure the scene. He is…"

"Shhh, I'll secure you, the scene is not as important as you."

"Sa…"

"I told you to shut up." Sara took Sofia's hand and for the first time she paid some attention to the area around her. They were behind an old sideboard, but from two sides there was no cover. Sara hoped, the steps she heard were of the shooter and he was gone.

"Sara?"

"Gil! We're here." She took a look around to make sure it was safe and stood up. There he was! And Brass too. And behind them a few officers.

"They're here, Sofia, they'll…" Sara looked down. Sofia was unconscious. "Oh shit! Gil, we need the paramedics."

"They're on their way." He was next to her, so was Brass.

"I can feel a pulse." Gil said.

"She talked to me a few seconds ago, got a bullet in the vest but all these blood here…"

"She wears your vest."

"Yes, I made her wear it. If she's crazy enough to go in here without back-up I wanted her to have at least some protection."

"Where's her vest?" Brass asked.

"In the car, we heard glass broken just after Gil called us. She went in so that the suspect can't run away, they started a shooting, I heard her screaming and came in. I think, he's gone."

"My men are after him. Do you know in which direction he left?"

Sara tried to remember. "I think…in the north way."

"Okay, stay with her." Brass got up and ran in the north direction.

"How many were here?"

"I guess one."

"He shot at you?"

"No. As soon as I heard Sofia's scream I went inside, called out I'm the police and I heard him running. I didn't follow because of her."

"That's alright, it's more important to secure the officer." Gil put his hand on Sara's shoulder. "Everything will be alright."

"If she wouldn't be that stubborn and had waited outside, she'd alright. Now she's injured and the guy is on the run."

The paramedics and more police came in the shed. Sara and Grissom made some space for the paramedics.

"Go with her." Grissom said.

"What?"

"Get the vest, make her describe the guy. We've got a photo, but it's old. Do your job, get the evidence."

"Okay." Sara followed the paramedics. She hoped Sofia would be alright soon.

Half an hour later she bagged her own vest.

"Sara?" Sofia opened her eyes. She was in bed, the doctors had given her some painkiller, cleaned the scratches and she was free to go in an hour or so. All the blood was from the scratches, no serious injuries and all she'd have from the bullet would be a colorful bruise.

"Yes?"

"Thanks."

"What for?" Sara put the vest away.

"By making me wearing your vest you saved my life."

"I've to take care of my detective if she can't do that herself. Everybody would've done the same."

"No, you know that's not true."

"Sure it is."

Sofia managed to sit up. It was painful and she felt dizzy. If it was because of the medicine or because of her injuries, she wasn't sure.

"Sara?"

"Mhm? Do you have any evidence on you? Did you touch the man? Got any traces of him?"

"No, I was too far away." She held her arms so that Sara could see Sofia's hands. The investigator took a look at the finger. No traces under the nails.

"How far were you away from him?"

"I think ten, fifteen yards."

"Too far away. Tell me what happened."

"He started shooting, I got down, shot back, he managed to hit me."

"How many shots?"

"He fired three times, then me, his fourth bullet got me. I managed to shot one more time, then I fell. I could hear you coming in."

"I heard your scream."

"My hero."

"I'd be a hero if I'd stop you from walking in. That was crazy."

"It's my job to stop him."

"Not if the price is to catch a bullet."

"Will be a little bruise, I'll survive."

"Thanks God you will." She wrote Sofia's statement down. Nothing new, no real help.

"Sara?"

"Yes?"

"Am I really your detective?"

"We're working this case together, you're my detective."

"You know I don't mean it that way." Sofia held on to Sara's hands. The brunette avoided the eyes of the blonde and got her hands back.

"You've been shot and you're under medicine, you should sleep a little bit."

"Sara…" Sofia tried to reach for her, but Sara walked a few steps back, still avoiding any eye contact.

"Sleep, Sofia, have a rest. Believe me, as soon as you'll be back, there'll be somebody with you. As much as I've heard, they weren't that happy with you wearing my vest and me giving you the vest. Get prepared for some trouble. Maybe the best is to pretend to be sleeping for the rest of the day."

"I didn't want to cause you any problems."

"It's alright, but the next time, stay out of the line of fire and wait for the back-up, please." Sara was ready to leave the room.

"Can we have another minute? Private minute?"

"Sorry, I've to go to the lab. Sleep. I see you when you're back." It was more like a flight what Sara did. She didn't want to talk to Sofa, she didn't want to be in the same room like the blonde. She didn't want to talk about that, what Sofia wanted to talk. Sara knew exactly what that was and she'd do whatever it took to avoid that.

"They've got him." Gil came to Sara who sat in the changing room.

"Really?"

"Yeah. Caught him at a petrol station. He's on his way downtown, Brass is waiting for him, I'll go there to. Wanna come?" Sara thought for a moment. She wanted to see the man who tried to make birds out of human, she wanted to see the man, who shoot at Sofia. And at the same time, she didn't want to see him.

"Yes." She could leave whenever she wanted.

"They had almost reached the door when Ecklie called her back.

"Sidle!"

"My report is on your desk, Ecklie."

"I know, I read it. Why did you give your vest away?"

"What?"

"Why did you give your vest away?" Ecklie came closer. "That's against the rules."

"She went in the shed without back-up and without any security."

"That's the problem of the police department, not ours."

"She was a csi."

"Was. Past tense."

"I was outside…"

"The man could have come in your direction, in that case you were without any protection."

"I was hiding behind a barrel, I was fine." Sara got angry. What hell was wrong with this man? Okay, she gave away her vest, so what? Because of that Sofia was alive, had only a bruise and a few scratches instead of a bullet in her chest.

"Conrad, the vest probably saved Sofia's life. I think that's the most important thing." Grissom said. "Or would you prefer to have a detective dead over a vest?"

"I…"

"Would you?"

"No."

"See. They did what was right and best."

"The best doesn't mean a bullet in a vest of an investigator wore by a detective. They acted irresponsible and we'll have another about this, Sidle." He turned and walked away.

Sara closed her eyes and took a deep breath. God, how she wanted to punch the shit out of this asshole.

"Come on." Gil turned her softly and got her out of the building.

"I hate him."

"He's not worth your feelings, Sara." Gil put his arm around Sara.


	16. Chapter 16

**Sunday evening**

„What are you doing here?" Sara couldn't believe her eyes. All she wanted was being away from the lab, far far away from work, from her colleagues, from everybody. Didn't she have enough trouble the last couple of days with people? Because of people. She had now two nights off, Ecklie had told her off before she left the lab, she wanted to be alone. And the last person of the earth she wanted to see was standing in front of her. Her blond hair falling over her shoulder, the sunglasses over her eyes even if it was absolutely not necessary in a building.

"Waiting for you." Sofia didn't move.

Sara knew the eyes of the detective were on her, observing every move she made.

"Leave me alone. All I want is to be by myself, have some time for myself and not see anybody. That includes you, you're actually top of the list of all the people I don't want to see."

"What a pity that I don't care."

Sara threw a hateful look at Sofia. Okay, if she wanted to be here, fine, Sara would simply go in her apartment, close the door and Sofia could do whatever she wanted to do outside.

"Stay here if you want, I'll go inside." She wouldn't let Sofia win, no way. She wasn't invited, she was unwanted, there was no point Sara would…

Just like Sara didn't care what Sofia wanted, did Sofia not really care what the investigator wanted or said. When Sara tried to pass her, Sofia's arm simply caught Sara's waist, pulled her to her and she kissed her. No words, nothing, she simply hold the investigator and didn't let go.

Before Sara could do anything or react, the kiss was over, Sofia pushed her away and started to leave the building.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?" Sara yelled angry.

"Leaving."

"Don't you dare to just walk away from me." If Sofia thought she could simply leave after this kiss she was wrong. She could he happy that Sara didn't hurt her.

"Stop me if you can."

"Stop now."

"Try harder." Sofia was almost at the door to the elevator when Sara was behind her. She grabbed the collar of the detective's shirt with the right hand, threw Sofia hard against the wall, that she thought she heard the crush of bones on stones. Not impressed by that Sara took her other hand, pressed Sofia harder against the wall and kissed her hard. Her tongues got itself the way free to the mouth of the detective and her right hand moved under Sofia's shirt, found one of her nipples and started to rub it. Sofia moaned as far as that was for her possible.

Just like that Sara let go and turned away.

"Don't you ever dare to walk away from me again, Sofia Curtis."

It took Sofia a few seconds to get herself together. Sara had kissed her, not only that. Sara had…one moment, Sara was about to go and leave her here alone.

A few inches before Sara's front door was closed Sofia reached it, kicked it hard to open it and got herself this way entry to Sara's apartment.

The investigator stumbled a few steps backwards from the unexpected push of her door. Sofia pushed the door with one hand to close it, got Sara's wrist, pulled her in her arms to press her in front of the wall. What Sara could do wasn't a problem for Sofia. She found Sara's mouth with hers and entered it with her tongue. Sara didn't even try to stop her from doing that, her tongue started to play with Sofias.

"Don't you ever dare to walk away from me, Sara Sidle." Sofia grumbled when they both needed to breath.

"Bite me."

"My pleasure." Sofia pressed Sara harder against the wall. The brunette shouldn't think she could escape.

"You gonna regret that." Sara moaned when Sofia's hands were on her shirt, rubbing her nipples through the cotton and the right knee of the detective opened itself the way between Sara's legs.

"Make me regret it"

"My pleasure." Sara's hands were back under Sofia's shirt, running over the skin. She opened the bra of the detective and cupped her breasts, feeling how Sofia had to struggle to stay in control. She reacted more with every touch of Sara's hand on her skin.

With one strong move Sofia torn Sara's shirt apart.

"No! Not!" The voice let Sofia stop immediately. Sara grabbed her shirt, tried to cover herself up and turned around. It was more the tone of her voice than the reaction later that hit Sofia hard.

"Sara, I…"

"Just don't please." Tears were on Sara's face.

"Sara, I'm sorry." Gently Sofia laid her arm on Sara's arm, waiting for the investigator to pull away. What did she do? Has she been too rough? There was passion, there was lust, Sofia had forgotten to control herself. She never intended to hurt Sara, to scare or to do anything, the brunette didn't want.

"Tell me what I did wrong. Please. Did I hurt? Did I scare you? I'm sorry I never wanted to do anything like this. Please…"

"It's not you." Sara was trembling.

Sofia moved her arm gently around Sara and to her relief, she was allowed to take Sara in her arms.

"I can't do this"

"You don't have to do anything." Sofia kissed Sara gently on her hair and held her tight. She wanted Sara to stop trembling, she wanted her to feel safe and comfortable.

"If you want I can leave you alone."

"Don't…don't go. It's not you. I just…I can't have that."

"You can't have what, honey?"

"I can't have you seen me naked. Please don't make me explain, please don't…"

"Shhhhh, you don't have to explain." Sofia slipped out of her jacket and put it gently over Sara's shoulder. A thing that wasn't necessary, they were in Sara's apartment, she could get her own clothes. But Sofia wanted her to be covered, like she wanted to be.

Sara wrapped her arms around herself, almost vanished in Sofia's jacket.

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be." Sofia's heart was about to break. What was wrong with Sara?

"Can you give me a minute?"

"I give you all the time in the world." Sara pulled Sofia gently to her and kissed her softly for a moment before she let go and vanished in her room, leaving the blonde in the hallway. Sofia picked up a button from Sara's shirt that ended up on the floor. She didn't know what she did wrong and even when Sara told her, it wasn't her fault, Sofia felt guilty. Everything was alright before she torn Sara's shirt. What did she do to her? What could it possible be? Why didn't Sara want Sofia to see her naked?

The kiss before Sara left made it only a little bit better. She was alright with Sofia around, she didn't turn her away. But what was it?

"Sofia?" Sara's voice was soft. Sofia almost thought, she might have dreamed hearing her name. Caution she walked to Sara's bedroom, where the brunette had into disappeared.

Sara was in her bed, the blanket up to her chin.

"Yes?"

"Would you come to bed with me?"

"Would you like me to be with you in bed?" Never again this voice, never again this, scared, helpless, not describable voice that Sara had made. Sofia never wanted to hear that again.

Sara moved the blanket so that Sofia had the change to slip under it. She stripped of her pants and moved slowly to Sara, who climbed into Sofia's arms as soon as she had the chance.

"Can you hold me, please?"

"Sure." Sofia embraced Sara and kissed gently her hair. If Sara wanted, Sofia could hold her for the rest of the night. Maybe that would help.

"I've got a scar." Sara started slowly.

"Most people have scars, that is nothing bad."

"No, not a small cut somewhere, I've got a big scar, it's up from my bellybutton until under my breasts. It is…huge…and…believe me, you don't want to see it. It will make you feel sick, you'll think I'm ugly and…"

"Stop that right now!" Sofia turned Sara around, to find her lips, kissed her, pulled her closer to herself. Slowly she stopped the kiss, got her finger under Sara's chin to make her look into Sofia's eyes.

"Don't you ever say something like that again. You are not ugly, you are beautiful. I'd never ever think you're ugly, there's nothing in the world that would make me think this way."

"You…your body is so perfect and I'm…mine is…"

"How do you know how my body looks? You've never seen me naked or did I miss something? Were you in the shower room with a telescope glass spying under the door to see me, Sara Sidle? Tell me, are you this kind of woman who's spying on other women in the shower?"

"No." Sara had to smile.

"So, how do you know how my body looks?"

"That what I can see looks perfect. Your legs are endless."

"So is my ability to annoy you. Don't judge my body before you've seen it. And don't judge my opinion and me before you have seen me how I react. If you think you can scare me away with a scar, you're wrong. Try harder."

"The last time I tried harder, I smacked you in front of a wall." Sara had to chuckle.

"Yes, you almost broke my spine."

"I'm sorry."

"That's a thing a bad ass cop makes, not a csi."

"Maybe I'm a bad ass csi."

"Well, for your kisses you could need a license, they're like weapons, blew me over."

"You kissed me first"

"Yes, I did. I thought if I wait for you and your first move, I'd be old and gray."

"That's why you kissed me after I told you to get lost?"

"I kissed you because you wanted me to kiss you. You only used the wrong words, lucky for us I'm so smart and understood you right."

"You're smug again."

"I'm always smug." Sofia kissed Sara behind her ears, down her neck,

"What is your goal for today?" Sara whispered. She had to concentrate on breathing, Sofia's kisses made her pulse run.

"My goal was kissing you, I succeeded there. The rest is optimal."

"Really?" Sara turned to find Sofia's lips with hers.

"Really."

"Well, I know you're wild, that's why you're the black panther, I've got…I had a shirt that can prove that…"

"Sorry. You just made me…wild."

Sara chuckled and went on kissing Sofia's neck. "That's alright, I've got another one. What I'm interested in now is, can you also be soft and gentle?"

"Like a kitten."

"Really?"

"Really." Sofia got slightly out of Sara's arms and moved her body on Saras without stopping to kiss her.

Sara's hands touched Sofia's sides, went softly under her shirt. The bra was still loose, Sofia never bothered to fix it again.

"You're not proper dressed."

"Well, you can choose: dress me up proper or undress me. What would you prefer?"

Sara's hands grabbed the shirt and pulled it over Sofia's head. The bra vanished at the same time.

"I guess I've got my answer." Sofia kissed the sides of Sara's neck.

"Sofia."

"Yes?" She didn't stop kissing Sara.

"Do you think you can make love to me without that I…without taking my shirt off?"

Sofia stopped kissing Sara, slipped next to her, caught her eyes with hers while she gently let her fingers run over the cotton von Sara's white shirt.

"If you want it that way, yes. But I can assure you, even without a shirt, you'll look beautiful to me."

"Give me some time, please."

"All the time in the world, honey. All the time in the world." She pulled Sara closer to herself and kissed her on the mouth. The feeling of having their tongues playing with each other was breathtaking. Sofia was sure she could do the whole day nothing else than kissing Sara.

When Sara woke up she was alone. With her hand she felt the side of the bed where Sofia had been when Sara fell asleep. Cold. The blonde must been gone.

She sat up. No clothes, no signs that Sofia had ever been here. It looked like the last night was only a dream Sara had or…

"Great, I was a one – night – stand." Sara sighed. She was disappointed that Sofia was gone. It didn't feel like an affair, at least not to Sara. If she had known…she got up and walked in the kitchen. Coffee. Maybe with some rum. No reason not to drink after this experience.

She put on the coffee machine and went in the bathroom for a shower. Was that what people do the morning after an affair? She was never interested in that, her sexual relationships had been long time relationships, but as far as she could remember Sofia's comments, some of them, she had some affairs. Looks like Sara was another one.

Why had it felt that great when it was nothing?

Fighting with some tears, some of frustration, some of anger, some because she was hurt, she left the bathroom, wrapped in a towel and walked to the coffee machine. No need to get dressed, she could stay in bed for the rest of the day.

"Good morning." Sara almost dropped her cup. She turned around. There was Sofia. Dressed, with Sara's keys in one hand and a bag in the other.

"Sorry, I borrowed them."

"You are still here?" It wasn't supposed to sound like it does.

"Yeah sure. Or am I not welcome?"

"Sure you are. It was just…I woke up and weren't there, your clothes were gone, no sign of you so I thought…"

"You thought, I left you. You thought, you were just an one night stand for me." Sofia wanted to be mad at Sara for thinking these things, but she could see the fear, the sorrow and desperation in her eyes. With two long steps she was with Sara, left the bag on the bench and took Sara in her arms.

"I'm sorry." Sara sobbed.

"Don't be sorry, I should have left a message. I wanted to surprise you with breakfast in bed." She kissed Sara gently on the tip of the nose.

"I blew it."

"No you didn't."

"I did."

"Know what?" Sofia pulled Sara gently away from herself and smiled. "We'll simply start all over again. Good morning honey, I hope you had a good sleep. I brought us some breakfast. Care for fresh coffee and bagels in bed?"

"Yes." Sara had to laugh.

"Great. I even don't mind if you stay in that towel, let's pretend it's a public holiday and we don't have to work…oh we both do not have to work today. It must be a special private holiday."

"You're crazy."

"Little bit, yes. Come on, honey, tell me where I get all the stuff I need to provide you a lovely breakfast."

"In the cupboard over the sink and in the fridge. Most of it is in the fridge."

"Perfect. Go back to bed, pretend you're asleep, I'll wake you up with breakfast. Just like I'd planed."  
Sara smiled, kissed Sofia and walked back to her bedroom.

Sofia opened the cupboard to get some jam, honey and peanut butter. Her surprise had to be re-newed.

Oh Sara. How could she possible think Sofia would tread her like a one-night-stand? Didn't Sofia make it very clear last night how much Sara meant to her? How happy she was to be with her. That she wanted to be with her all the time. Why would she leave her in the morning? Yes, Sofia had affairs, but she would never have an affair with Sara. Sara was too important, Sara was too special, Sara was…simply Sara. You don't mess around with Sara. Enough people had messed around with her. Sofia didn't know exactly who and how, but she could see and feel it.

With the breakfast on the tray she walked in the bedroom. Sara was in the bed, doing was she was supposed to do: pretending to sleep.

Careful Sofia placed the tray on the nightstand, crawled in the bed and started to kiss Sara's neck.

"Good morning, sleeping beauty. Wake up, there's some coffee waiting for you."

"Mhmmm." Sara turned around, her eyes closed, looped her arms around Sofia's neck, pulled her to her and kissed her.

"Better than coffee."

"You're right, much better." Sofia slipped under the blanket. "Somebody got dressed in her sleep." She picked on Sara's shirt and boxer short.

"Uhmmm, I was lonely, it was cold, I needed something to warm me."

"Well, I'm back now, I could take that away."

"You're the one who's fully dressed."

"Is it my mistake that nobody seems to care? That nobody wants to undress me? What do you think?"

"I think, my name is Nobody." Sara grabbed Sofia's shirt and pulled it over the blonde's head. Because time was valuable, she took the bra with it.

"You're a fast one."

"I always deal fast with complaints, yes." She unbuttoned the pants and pulled it with the help of her feet down. Now Sofia was naked.

"Feeling better now?" The detective grinned.

"Much better."

"Good." She spooned Sara and started to kiss her neck. "And now, only to make it clear, very clear: Sara Sidle, you are not an affair to me! You are no one night stand. It's impossible. And if you get your self-esteem out of the gutter one day, you'll see that. It would not only be very stupid to have an affair with a colleague, would make working together hard, you should also know, I respect you, I care you for – a lot. How could I use you in this way? I wouldn't deserve any respect at all. Maybe you don't like the idea having somebody in your life, maybe you don't like the idea somebody really cares for you, wants you. But you know what? I don't care! I do all these things, regardless if you like them or not. So it's much better and easier if you get used to them otherwise I gonna force you to accept them. Got me?"

"Yes." Sara had her eyes closed and enjoyed every little kiss Sofia placed on her neck.

"Good. So the next time I'll go out and get us some breakfast, you won't cry! You won't think I left you! You'll think: Sofia is gone, she'll get us some breakfast, I'll make the coffee and greet her with a kiss at the door. Deal?"

"Deal."

"And now turn around, I want your lips on mine. Wherever you want and can place them too. I missed these lips."


	17. Chapter 17

"Sara?"

"Yes?" Sara looked up. Greg had joined her in the lab while she was finishing up a case, that had took her only a few hours. She good tell from the sound of the voice of her young friend, it was something serious, something personal.

"Can I asked you something?"

"Sure."

"Did you hear the rumor?"

"Which rumor?" The lab was like a soap opera, there were every night so many rumors, most of them were wrong, ridiculours, but they stay quite long.

"About you."

"About me?" Sara was surprissed. What rumor could there be about her?

"Yes."

"No, tell me."

"We're friends, right?"

"Greggo, tell me." She pinned her eyes on him. He tried to hold her eye contact, failed and looked at the floor.

"There's a rumor you are…having an affair."

"With whom?" The old story about Grissom again? Since they weren't together anymore, a lot of people thought, they were. Nobody ever wasted any thought of that when they were together. Strange world.

"Unfortunately it's not me."

"We don't have an affair, Greg."

"No, as I said, unfortunately. It's Sofia."

"Sofia?"

"Yeah, absolute ridiculous, but it's there and it is getting stronger. Especially since Sofia started to spends her breaks with us – every time when you're there"

"I'm here almost every evening." What was the point?

"She didn't do that before. She even joins us now in the morning."

"Greg, I can promise you, I don't have an affair with anybody."

"No affair with Sofia?"

"No, we've got a relationship."

"What" Greg's face lost all his color.

"I tell you this as a friend, that means I hope, you won't tell it anybody else. Sofia and me, we are together."

"Wow…why..I mean…wham…since when?"

"Three weeks."

"I didn't know…"

"Don't ask me how and why, I can't tell you. All I can tell you is that I'm very, very happy with her."

"That's good." Greg woke up from his legasty. He went to Sara and hugged her. "I hope, she's nice to you and not the bad ass cop."

"Our black panther is a kitten to me. No need to worry."

"Good. Are you planing to tell the other?"

"One day, yes. At the moment it's too new, we have to get used to each other first and I'd like to do that without any pressure and comments from the outside. And you know some of the cops, they might give her a hard time."

"I'm sure, our guys will be happy for you."

"I know. But she isn't a csi anymore."

"She could come back, just for you."

"Ecklie would be delighted, having Sofia back because she wants to be with me. No, it's better this way, we'll see each other on the scene, work some scenes and that's it."

"Can I go out with the two of you?"

"I thought you're scared of her." Sara laughed.

"You'll take care of me."

"All you want is to be with two women."

"Two beautiful women, yes. All the guys will be jealous when I have one of you in each arm."

"And then I'll kiss her and everybody knows, you're not playing with us."

"You never know."

"Oh, believe me, I do know."

"Pity." He grinned wide. A man was allowed to dream and that was definitely a dream, he liked.

A few hours later, he was far away from grinning.

"Hey Greg."

"Sofia." He flushed. How could she do that? With just two words and a smile. A very dangerous smile, in Greg's opinion.

"Let's have breakfast together. You still owe me one breakfast date."

"Uhm…I…you…I'm not the right person for a breakfast date."

"Yes you are. Come on, I don't accept a no. Grissom told me, you're done with your work, there's no chance you can escape this time."

"You should take Sara out."

"I'll do that another day. Today I want you."

And these words made him shruggle.

"O-okay."

"Let's go." Greg chucked and followed Sofia. He was in a trap, couldn't get out. Damn it. Why did she ask him? Hadn't Sara told him a couple of hours before they were together? Sofia should go out with Sara and not with him. And when she wanted him to join, she could asked in a less threatening way.

They both drove in separate cars to the diner the night shift most of the times had breakfast. It was open 24/7, good and cheap.

Greg ordered a continental breakfast, Sofia some pancakes and a big coffee.

"See, we're here for a breakfast." Sofia grinned when they were seated face to face.

"Yes, we are. Happy?"

"I am. You look a little bit uncomfortable."

"You should be here with Sara. I know that you and her…that you're together."

"And?"

"And? It should be her sitting here with you."

"Being in a relationship doesn't mean being in chain. I don't cuff Sara on me and she isn't trying to keep me close all the time. We're adults, we can meet other people."

"What do you mean meet other people?"

"Going out with somebody else."

"We're havin g breakfast, we're not going out."

"I know. You can relax."

"If you hurt Sara in any kind of way…" Greg was surprised how angry his voice suddenly sounded. No more fear, no my shyness. If Sofia would do anything that would hurt Sara, he would make her regret.

"Calm down, Greg, I've no intention to do that."

"Good. If you do, I'll forget how scary you can be and kick your ass. I promise, I'll make you regret. She's too special, too sensitive too…"

"Greg? I know that." Sofia's voice was serious. "And I think the same. If anybody will hurt her, I'll make this person pay, no matter what it cost. Just to let you know, she'll be here in a few seconds, just parked her car outside."

Greg had a look out of the window and saw Sara on the car park.

"Good."

"It's good to know you care for her too, Greg." Sofia said softly.

"Hey guys." Sara – and to Greg's surprise Grissom, whom he hadn't seen outside – came to the table. Sara sat next to Sofia, giving her an extra smile, Grissom sat next to Greg.

"Oh, pancakes." Sara's eyes brighten when Sofia got her breakfast,

"Order your own!" Sofia slapped Sara's hand when she wanted to grab one pancake.

"I ordered a fruit salad and an omelette. If you share the pancakes, I share the omelette."

"What kind of omelette?"

"Mushroom."

"Okay. But hands of my chocolate sauce."

"In a healthy relationship you're supposed to share, Sofia." Grissom grinned.

He knows too, Greg thought. Who else? Was it okay that Sara and Sofia had a relationship or would there be any trouble with Ecklie? Obviously not with Grissom.

"Well, if it comes to chocolate, our relationship is not very healthy. Hers is mine and mine is not her business."

"Maybe I should think this relationship over again." Sara smirked.

"You can think as much as you want, honey, you'll always end up with the same thing: you belong to me."

"Don't be too self assure."

"I am. In this case, I am."

"She has no reason to be scared Sara. Even while you try to pretend to be mad at her, you hold her hand." He pointed on the two women. Sofia was eating with her right hand, Sara with her left, what meant, both hold each others hands.

"Stop being like that, Gil. Don't observe everything." Sara grinned.

"It's too obvious, isn't it, Greg?"

"Uhm…whatever you say."

"Greggo is a little bit shy still." Sofia laughed. "And you have no idea how difficult it was to get him here. He was looking for excuses to stay away. Maybe he thought, I want him on a date. If I hurt you, Sara, he'll kill me."

"I help him hide the body." Sara said dryly.

"I won't investigate this murder." Grissom offered.

"You're all three against me."

"I'm on your side as long as you're nice to me." Sara squeezed Sofia's hand.

"I'm always nice to you."

"So far I can't complain. Time will show if it stays this way."

"At the moment I feel a little bit under pressure. Thanks God I can handle pressure very good. There won't be any reason for you to send your guardian dogs at me, Sara, I'll tread you like the gold treasure you are."

"And kick her ass if she wants to come with you when you secure a scene. She has to wait until you clear it. No complaining, no chance for a deal." Grissom said and earned an evil look from Sara for this.

"Thanks Gris, I'll do that." Sofia smiled. Finally somebody thought the same she did.


	18. Chapter 18

"I'm sorry, I know I'm late." Sara took a breath and look apologetic at Sofia. The blonde was sitting at a bar in the Bellagio, drinking a cocktail.

"That's alright." Sara was around fifteen minutes late.

"You weren't lonely."

"Not really." Sofia grinned wide.

"No surprise." Sara let her eyes running over her girl friend, from head to toes and back. Sofia looked astonishend. She wore a skin tight black dress that made her legs endless and showed exactly, that she had all the proportions exactly where they were supossed to be. Sara had watched a guy trying to hit on her, his eyes were almost fallen out of his head. Sofia had smiled and sent him away.

"Just that one I saw or some more?"

"Four."

"Wow. What did they do? Lined up?"

"Kind of, I guess. Do I look like I'm lonely and want somebody to talk to me?"

"With me by your side you look fine."

"And when you're not by my side I look like I'm waiting only for you."

"You know what I want to hear. But I know how you used your body to get whoever you wanted to have."

"Yes, I did. Past. The important thing about this. I used to, I don't do that anymore. I finished this time of my life before we got together."

"Unbelievable. Having only one person when you can have…almost everybody."

"I'm getting old."

"Invisible."

"That's my girlfriend." Sofia pulled Sara closer to her and kissed her gently on the cheek. "

"Oh my goodness." The bartender looked horrified at Sofia.

"What?" She laughed at him. She knew him since she was in Las Vegas, this was her favorite bartender, she usually went here once a week if she had the time.

"I don't believe that."

"Josh, it's not the first time you see me kissing a woman."

"No, I saw you…doing other things to woman in the club, but…honey, do you know what happened to you?"

"No, what?" She grinned interested. What did happen to her? If it was something with Sara, it could only be great.

"She's got you. You're hooked. Sofia, you're settled."

"I beg your pardon?" They were together since four weeks, how could Josh say, Sofia was settled?

"Oh, don't try to play it down. I saw that look you gave her. I saw you looking at the others. You see her, you never saw the others. Detective, this woman got you. You're hooked. Never thought I'd see that. Congratulation, Lady." He smiled at Sara.

"Thanks…I think."

"Josh, the lovely Lady is Sara, we work together. Sara, that's Josh, the most annoying barkeeper in the town. Unfortunately he's also the most adorable dancer in the city. You should see him in the club, it's a feast for the eyes to see him move. We should go later over and watch him. How long are you working today?"

"Until midnight."

"Maybe we'll see you there. As you said, I'm hooked, I can't make a decision anymore. Leave that all to my lovely sweetheart."

"I'm shocked." He grinned and walked to another customer.

"Interesting guy, intersting facts about you."

"Why?"

"I'm special."

"I could have told you the same. In fact, I think I did that a few times. You are very special, Sara Sidle." Sofia let her hands run over Sara's top and kissed her neck softly.

"You can tell me that a few more times."

"I will."

"And tell it the guy behind you, who's undressing you with his eyes."

Sofia didn't bother to turn around. "Honey, if I'd tell him about my gun, he'd run away."

"You don't have your gun with you." Sara looked with huge eyes at Sofia. She must be kidding. "Do you?" Her eyes ran again over Sofia's body. There was no way she could have the gun anywhere.

"I never go out without my gun."

"You. Must. Be. Kidding."

"I'm not. Use your imagination where it might be." Sofia smirked.

"You have just enough clothes on you to be not picked up by your colleagues for being a public offensive."

"Am I not amazing?"

"Absolutely." Sara moved close to Sofia and touched her waist. "There's no way you're hidding a gun under here. It's skin tight."

"Wanna search me?"

"If I'd do that we gonna end up with trouble."

"There's a restroom or, if you prefer some more privacy, check this out." Sofia lifted a key in her right hand.

"You've got a room key from here?"

"Yeah, I thought, I let us have a night in the hotel. A little celebration, some luxery."

Sara grabbed the key and sticked it in her pocket.

"I take it, I've got pockets, can't lose it."

"So do you feel like some body searching before we're out for a dance."

Sara pulled Sofia closer to her and whispered in her ear: "I don't feel like dancing."

"What do you feel like?" Sofia grinned while her hair in her neck went up.

"Using this room. Now."

"Okay." She took Sara's hand and pulled her to one of the elevators.

The door wasn't really closed when Sara pushed Sofia in front of the wall, started to kiss her.

"If they weren't any cameras, I wouldn't wait until we're in the room."

"I'm sure the guys enjoy even this. Shall we give them a wave?"

"Why not?" They turned to the camera, grinned and waved. Sara worked in one the elevator here once, she knew exactly where the camera was.

As soon as they left the elevator and found their room door, Sara's hand were back on Sofia. Kissing, her hands all over Sofia's body she kicked the door closed. Again Sofia ended in front of the next wall so that she couldn't escape Sara's hands. Up and down, up and down, with an especially long stop on her nipples, rubbing them softly.

Sofia simply got her hands under Sara's shirt, opened the bra and begann to rub Sara's nipples between her fingers.

"You think the guys downstairs would have liked to know that I don't wear any underwear?"

"They'd have taken you in the bar, not wasting any time with rooms or privacy. So had I."

"Really? You should know by now that I don't wear underwear."

"I do." Sara's lips went down Sofia's throat.

"So, where do I have my gun? Any idea? You searched everywhere?" Sofia had to breath harder when Sara's right hand moved under her dress, going straight between her legs.

"I know where it not is, I'm quite close to this point."

"I'm sure the guys would think it's exactly where your hand is." Sofia's finger got faster just like her breath.

"Guys are stupid. I know you don't want to have anything else in your than me." And with these words she entered Sofia with two fingers. The blonde moamed loud.

"Sara, I…ohmygod…" Two fingers in her, a third one giving her a hard and fast massage together with all the tension, lust and passion were too much. Sofia's lips found Sara's neck, sucked the skin hard in her mouth.

"Sara!" Trembling, sucking, hard breathing and Sara's nipples rubbing and her name calling Sofia came and lost almost her balance. Sara had to catch her. She used her weight for that while her own orgasm pushed her closer to Sofia.

Exhausted both women slipped on the floor, still in each others arms and unable to do, say or even open their eyes.

Sofia had no idea how long she just laid there until she was able to say something.

"Fuck."

"Again? Give me another minute, hon." Sara grinned and opened her eyes.

"Or two?"

"Limit." Sara kissed Sofia's cheek. The blonde's face was wet from sweat and Sara could taste some salt.

"You're salty."

"You're surprissed? I cry when you fuck my brain out. Hell, what have you done to me?"

"I searched you for a weapon, couldn't find one. And no underwear."

"The underwear is in the bag on the bed, the gun is in my handbag. I thought it's an obvious place to put a gun."

"Oh, the handbag."

"Yes."

"Sorry, next time I'll have a look there and not at you."

"Don't you dare, I want you to search me first." Sofia tried to sit. It wasn't black anymore in front of her eyes, but everything looked still a little bit blurry.

"Sweety?"

"Uhm?" Sara didn't want to get up.

"I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"For a huge love bite on your neck." Sofia could see a very big red mark on Sara's neck, it would stay for longer than a few hours.

"I worked hard for it, I deserve it."

"You deserve even more."

"See."

"What will you say in the lab?"

"Not their business?"

"They'll ask you for the next couple of days."

"Not their business. Remember, I'm the private person."

"How could I forget that? Miss Private Life."

"Yes, that's me." Somehow Sara managed to get up, swayed as soon as her hand left the wall. A few seconds later and she found her balance.

"Come on." She offered her hand to Sofia, who took it and got up on her feet. "I want to see the rest of the room. The carpet behind the door is very…impressive."

"So is the wall." Sofia grinned and showed Sara the bedroom. A big bed was in the middle of the room and from the window they could see the fountain.

"That would have been a nicer ambiente." Sara pulled Sofia closer to her while she watched the fountain show. They had the rest of the evening for this.

"The two minutes are over, we can repeat it."

"I'm afraid, that was a once in the lifetime experience."

"You're probably right. Wanna see the bathroom?"

"Yes. I brought a bag with clothes here, I won't leave the place in this dress tomorrow."

"You're lucky that it's not torn."

"I know. Good job. Again."

Sara smirkd and followed Sofia to the bathroom.

"Wow." A bath for two was waiting for them.

"Unfortunately it's only a bath, no spa."

"Who cares? It looks great. We should use it."

"We have to. It was expensive, I paid for the whole room, I'll use everything." Sofia grinned amused.

"I won't ask for a price."

"Good girl. Now, you will get the champagner and the strawberries out of the fridge, I'll arrange the bathroom."

"Arrange? What did you plan?"

"Let me surprise you."

"Your last surprise was this room, I loved that surprise."

"See." Sofia kissed Sara and pushed her gently out of the bathroom.

Laughing Sara went to the kitchen, found the champagner and the strawberries. Sofia had thought of everything. Sara cut off the green of the strawberries and just because she was curious what else her girlfriend had brought, she started to open all cupboards. After the second door she found a bottle of chcolate sauce. With a wide smile she took the bottle with her to the bathroom.

Sofia wasn't lazy, she had the bath filled with water and foam and around the bath were two dozen of candles. From somewhere came music, Frank Sinatra.

"Wow, you're a show off."

"I wanted to impress you with the bath, but after you impressed me so much in the hall, I think, nothing will come close to that…place."

"You never know." Sara placed the open bottle of champagner, two glases and the strawberries next to the bath. "Look what I've found." She hold the chocolate sauce in front of Sofia's face.

"I've no idea how that ended up in this room. The last guest must have forgotten it."

"Yes, it was even not opened."

"What a lucky coincidence."

"Yes." Sara smirked.

"What?"

"Nothing. I think, it's time for the water, otherwise that will get cold and the champagner warm."

"Okay, I'll give you a minute, call me when you're in the water, I'll come in as your personal life guard." Sofia wanted to give Sara the chance to vanish in the foam before she came in the water. Her girlfriend was properly not comfortable with having here around when she got undressed. Only if she would wear a shirt, what would be also fine with Sofia. Whatever made Sara happy.

"I don't have an undress service?" Sara looked disappointed.

"I thought…I didn't…I mean…you don't want me to see…" Sara kissed Sofia to stop her.

"Do you think you can handle to see it?" If it would scare Sofia away, the evening would be destroyed.

"Sure. I told you, for me you're beautiful."

"Then you should undress me – after I got rid off the one piece of clothe you wear. No underwear, no weapon." Sara's hands found the zip on the back of Sofia's back while their lips met. Slowly, not stopping kissing, Sofia's dress slipped down.

"I could look at you for hours and would be amazed the whole time." Sara whispered.

"Ditto. To be honest, I do that sometimes when you're sleeping."

"You should sleep then too."

"I know but it's worth missing out sleep if I can watch you."

Sara took Sofia's hands and placed them on her waist. "The water is getting cold."

"I'm sure we can add some more warm water, don't rush me enjoying time with my girlfriend."

"Just thinking about all the things you worked on for tonight."

"You're my number one priority." Sofia kissed Sara and let her fingers run softly over the brunette's body, feeling and hearing how Sara responded to that. Slowly she unbuttoned the pants, pulled them down, placing kisses all over the skin, she could see now. When her lips arrived on the little bit of cotton of Sara's thongs, she drew little circle with her tongue, to make Sara lose her control more. Inch for inch she pulled the thongs down, kissing her way up on Sara's left leg, soflty biting her tights.

"You' ve got a good advance if you go on like this." Sara moaned

"I'll catch up with you, no worries." She got back on her feet, gently touching Sara's face with her indexfinger. Their lips found themselves and their tongues started to dance with each other.

Softly Sofia opened the first button of Sara's blouse. When she was sure Sara didn't feel uncomfortable, she opened the next one. Taking all the time in the world, she removed her lips from Sara's when she finished the shirt. Kiss by kiss she worked her way down the face, the throat, deeper to Sara's bra. She found her nipples, teased them with her tongue.

Her hands opened the bra and pulled it softly down, together with the blouse. Her lips lost contact with Sara only for a split of a second when she let bra and blouse drop on the floor. Immediately her mouth embraced one nipple and Sara's tension when she lost the rest of her protection, was gone as soon as Sofia started sucking.

"You're making it very hard for me to stay cool." Sara moaned.

"Good, that's exactly what I want." Sofia came back up to Sara, took her hand and pulled her to the bath. "I want to finish you in there."

"You want to finish me?" Even if she was still not complete comfortable, Sara had to laugh. She was sure, Sofia hadn't seen the scar yet, her eyes were the whole time closed or she held eye contact with Sara.

"In a satisfying way."

"Sounds interesting." Sofia let Sara enter the bath first and as soon as the brunette was almost vanish in water and foam, she followed her. Carefully she placed herself on Sara, holding her in her arms and closed her eyes. Finally there was nothing between them. Finally she could feel Sara's body completely.

"Your skin feels so good on mine." She whispered.

"Tell me about it, it's like heaven."

"It is heaven, Sara." They enjoyed being like that for a few minutes, then Sofia started to move again. Her lips found again their way down Sara's body, but this time they didn't stop, they went straight to her bellybutton. From above the bellybutton until right under Sara's right breast was a long, deep scar. Sofia kissed careful every inch of it, her face coming back every few seconds to Saras when she needed to breathe.

"There's too much water in this bath."

"Really?" Sara laughed.

"Yes. I can't do what I want to do,"

"Maybe we can let some water out later."

"Why later?"

"I want to have some champagner first. Foam and water don't effect the champagner and the strawberries."

"Mhm, you can be my dessert, okay." Sofia slipped next to Sara.

"You dessert? I thought you'll be mine, I'll pour some chocolate sauce over you and lick it from your body."

"Stop putting such pictures in my head or you'll have five seconds for the champagner and the strawberries."

"The panther is back."

"The panther was never gone." Sofia raised her eyebrows.

"For a panther you were very, very gentle a few minutes ago."

"We're dangerous but we're elegant too. We know when we have to be careful and when we can just attack."

"You are sexy."

"Likewise."

"I'm not…"

"Don't say another word. You are sexy."

"You saw…"

"Yes, I saw the scar and I won't ask you how you got it, I'll wait until you want to tell me. But I can promise you, you are sexy. I adore every inch of you."

"Why?"

"Why? Well let me see." Sofia cocked her head. "There is this soft spot behind your right ear, here." Sofia kissed Sar behind her ear. "Every time I kiss you there, you melt like ice cream in the desert summer sun. Then there is this reaction of you when I embraced one of your nipples with my lips and when I suck then…" Sofia embraced Sara's left nipples and started to suck, what let Sara immediately moan.

"That's what I mean. A lovely sound, you're moaning for and because of me. You know how much I love this little gap between you teeth, absolutely sexy, a smile and I'm the ice cream in the dessert summer sun. This brown eyes are magnetic, they catch me and I can't let go. You've got no fucking idea how difficult it was not to stare in your eyes before we were together. It was more difficult than restraining a whole street gang. I like your legs, they're so long and every time I see you ass, I'd like to sink my teeth in it. Then there's…"

"Stop it, I've got the point." Sara laughed. If she wouldn't stop Sofia, the blonde would go on the rest of the night,

"Good. And now get the bloody water out, I want to cover you in chocolate." She moved her hand to the back and was back on Sara before she could try to escape. Caught in a long kiss they separated when the whole water was gone. The champagner wasn't still in the glass but they didn't bother about that anymore.

"We're in a bath without water." Sara chuckled.

"Water is overrated." Sofia took the bottle of chocolate sauce.

"You don't really want to…" Cold chocolate sauce dropped on her breast. Yes, Sofia really wanted to cover her in chocolate!

The plan had been to be in bed for the second sex of the evening, that never happened. Sara had taken away the bottle with the chocolate sauce from Sofia before the whole bottle ended up on her and had started to spill the sauce on Sofia. Both being covered in chocolate, they had started to clean each other up what had brought them straight to a new orgasm in the empty bath.

After a shower they finally made it into bed. Snuggled close to each other, they watched the water fountain, holding each other without a word.

They must have been like this for over half an hour because Sara started to talk after they had seen the fountain the second time.

"I got my scar when I was seven."

Sofia knew it wouldn't be a happy story. Not that a scar was something that could make you happy, but some people got scars from doing something they had enjoyed. She had a little scar on her left food. She was nineteen, in college, out with friends for a weekend at the ocean, they had too much alcohol and Sofia stepped barfoot on a broken beer bottle. It was painfull, it bleeded like hell, but she had a great weekend.

Pulling Sara closer to herself she kissed the neck of the brunette.

"My dad was mad at me, I've no idea why. It was summer, I was outside, playing in the sun. He suddenly came out of the house, drunk, yelling, smashed his beer bottle and cut me. If my mum hadn't brought me straight to the ER I'd have died. I've no idea what they told the doctors, it must have been the biggest and best lie in the world, nobody tried to find out what happened to me." Again her parents. Did they ever do anything else than causing Sara pain? No matter if mentally or physically.

"It's a part of you, it's a part your life, there's no part in your life I don't like, I don't want to have in our life. I want the complete Sara Sidle paket, please."

"You got it all."

"Good. It's perfect."

"I doubt that."

"There's the only little mistake, you're not self – conscience enough."

"You're smug enough for both of us."

"We can share that. Try to be smug, sweety."

"No. You're the one with the perfect body."

"Bullshit."

"Honey, I saw you not only naked a few times, I also saw you in a hint of nothing, like tonight and what it does to most people. They were all you, you are the perfect woman. That's why…" Sara stopped.

"That's why what?" Sofia searched for Sara's eyes and found the eye contact after a few seconds.

"That's why I didn't want you to see my scar. You're so perfect."

"What did you tell the ones before me."

"They weren't perfect."

"In that case I believe now, you never had a relationship with Grissom. If you had, he would be perfect, the way you looked at him all these years, this stupid fool not seeing his great chance. Well, thanks for that, Mister Grissom. Now she's mine and I won't give her away."

Sara chuckled. Time to shock Sofia and to have some fun.

"I had a relationship with Grissom, for two years. We broke up a few months ago."

"What?" Sofia's face was full of disbelieve.

Sara laughed. "Yes."

"You never…"

"I never told anybody, we never told anybody. If anybody from the lab would have known that, we'd be in trouble. One of us would have been forced to leave the team, we didn't want that. When we broke up, nobody noticded it. We're friends, very close friends, but we couldn't give each other what we needed."

"Do you think I can give you what you need?" Sofia knew how much Sara thought of Grissom, how she adored him, how he was everything for her, in the job and probably also private. If he wasn't able to give her what she needed, how could Sofia ever be able to give her what she needed? It seemed impossible for her.

"You already did it, Sofia." Sara kissed Sofia gently. "You have no idea how much you give me every day what I need. You're there, you catch me when I fall. I can be weak when you're around, you take care of me without letting me feel helpless. You do so many things to make me happy, you pay attention, you share your feeling with me, you seem to know exactly what I need and when. It is like you can read my mind it's even not scary for me, it's great. You're the best thing that ever happened to me. I love you."

It was the first time that Sara said that to Sofia. With tears of joy in her eyes, the blonde pulled the brunette in her arms and kissed her long and soft.

"I love you too." And then they finally made love in the bed. Softly and gently, taking all the time in the world, concentrading on nothing else than the other person.

* * *

Note of Author: That's it for this story. I hope you enjoyed it. Thanks for all the reviews. There'll be a kind of continuance of this story, called "Twins" and it will be a bit of a crossover with CSI and NCIS L.A., but only one person and she'll be in Vegas.

I'm moving to a new place at the moment, it can happen that I don't update three times a week anymore until I've a new internet access but I'll try my best and one chapter per week will be there, that won't be a problem.

Thanks for reading and reviewing!

Fleppy85


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